Kingdoms of Europe - an illustrated encyclopedia

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 333

to aristocratic advisers, as it had to the validos of Castile the Spanish Succession (1702-14), the first world war
in the fifteenth century. Gaspar de Guzman, count-duke fought by European powers. In 1705 an Anglo- Austrian
of Olivares, attempted and failed to establish the central- force landed in Spain. Its advance on Madrid was halted
ized administration that his famous contemporary Car- by a Franco-Castilian army, but the invaders occupied
dinal Richelieu introduced in France. In reaction to his
bureaucratic absolutism, Catalonia revolted and was vir- Catalonia.
tually annexed by France. Portugal, with English aid,
reasserted its independence in 1640, and an attempt was The Bourbon Dynasty had been received enthusiasti-
made to separate Andalusia from Spain. In 1648 at the cally in Castile but was opposed by the Catalans not so
Peace of Westphalia, Spain assented to the emperor's much out of loyalty to the Habsburgs as in defense of

accommodation with the German Protestants and in their fueros against the feared imposition of French-style

1654 recognized the independence of the northern Neth- centralization by a Castilian regime. The war, fought on
a global scale, was also a Spanish civil war. England
erlands. agreed to a separate peace with France, and the allies
withdrew from Catalonia, but the Catalans continued
During the long regency for Charles II (1665-1701), their resistance under the banner "Privilegis o Mort"
the last of the Spanish Habsburgs, Spain's treasury was (Liberty or Death). Catalonia was devastated, and Bar-
milked by validos, and its government operated princi-
pally as a dispenser of patronage. The country was Vcelona fell to Philip after a prolonged siege (1713-14).
wasted by plague, famine, floods, drought, and renewed
war with France. The Peace of the Pyrenees (1659) The main European theaters of operation were in Ger-
ended fifty years of warfare with France, but Louis XIV, many and the Low Countries, where the allied coalition,
the young king of that expansionist country, found the led by Randolph Churchill, duke of Marlborough, had
temptation to exploit Spain during its enfeeblement too won a military advantage over the French. The Treaty
great. As part of the peace settlement the Spanish infanta of Utrecht (1713), which brought the war to a close,
recognized the Bourbon succession in Spain on the con-
Marie-Therese had become the wife of Louis XIV. On dition that Spain and France never be united under the
same crown. The Spanish Netherlands (Belgium) and
the pretext (technically a valid one) that Spain had not
paid her dowry, Louis instigated a war of devolution to Spain's Italian possessions, however, reverted to the
recover the debt, in territory, in the Spanish Nether- Austrian Habsburgs. England retained Gibraltar and
lands. Most of the European powers were ultimately Minorca, seized during the war, and was granted trade
concessions in Spanish America.
involved in Louis's wars in the Low Countries.

BOURBON SPAIN Philip V reigned

Charles II was the unfortunate product of generations of from 1701 to 1724.

inbreeding. He was unable to rule and remained child- Charles II, king of Spain
(1665-1701). In the thirty-six
less. The line of Spanish Habsburgs came to an end at his years of his reign he was credited
death. Habsburg partisans argued for allocating succes- with little but debited with much.

sion within the dynasty to its Austrian branch, but in one He was utterly destitute of
of his last official acts Charles II left Spain to his nephew, discernment, energy, and skill.
Philip of Anjou, a Bourbon and the grandson of Louis Sickly and hypochondriacal, it is
XIV. This solution appealed to Castilian legitimists, as
it complied with the principle of succession to the next surprising that he lived to be
in the bloodline. Spanish officials had been concerned thirty-nine years of age.

with providing for the succession in such a way as to

guarantee an integral, independent Spanish state that,
along with its possessions in the Netherlands and Italy,
would not become part of either a pan-Bourbon or a
pan-Habsburg Empire. "The Pyrenees are no more, "

Louis XIV rejoiced at his grandson's accession, but it

was the prospect of the Spanish Netherlands falling into
French hands that alarmed England and the Dutch es-

tates-general.

The acceptance of the Spanish crown by Philip V

(1701-46) in the face of counterclaims by Archduke
Charles of Austria, who was supported by England and

the Netherlands, was the proximate cause of the War of

334 THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

Philip V built the Oriente Palace for himself in Madrid but did not live Charles III (1759-88), Spain's enlightened despot par
excellence, served his royal apprenticeship as king of
to see its completion.
Naples. He was one of Europe's most active patrons of
Spain emerged from the war with its internal unity
and colonial empire intact but its political position in the Enlightenment, which had as its goal the reform of
Europe weakened. The Bourbon succession, which society through the application of reason to political,
ended the interminable wars that had pitted Spain social, and economic problems. Charles promised a gen-
against France since the fifteenth century, called for a eration of happiness and more efficient collection of
basic reorientation of foreign policy. The two Bourbon taxes. Despite the attempt to restructure the economy on
monarchies were linked diplomatically by a series of a rational basis, the impact of the Enlightenment was
family pacts, which were as much an expression of com- essentially negative. Anticlericalism was an integral part
of Enlightenment ideology but, because of government
mon national interests as of dynastic solidarity. Spain sponsorship, it was carried to greater lengths in Spain
than elsewhere in Europe. Considered antisocial because
conducted an aggressive campaign to recover the lost they were thought to discourage initiative, public chari-
Italian possessions and regained a measure of prestige ties financed by the church were abolished. Monasteries
under the protection of the French alliance. were suppressed and their property confiscated by the
state. The Jesuits, outspoken opponents of regalism,
Philip V also undertook to ratonalize Spanish govern- were expelled, virtually crippling higher education in
Spain. The teachings of medieval philosophers and of the
ment through his French and Italian advisers. Central-
ized government was institutionalized, local fueros were sixteenth-century Jesuit political theorists who had ar-
abrogated, regional parliaments abolished, and the inde-
pendent influence of the aristocracy on the councils of gued for the "divine right of the people" over their kings
were banned. Even the plays of Pedro Calderon de la
state destroyed. Barca were prohibited from performance, reputedly be-
cause of their "Jesuitical" bias. The Inquisition was em-
The Bourbon regime had its ideological foundation in ployed by the government to discipline antiregalist
regalism, a concept of statism that went beyond adminis-
trative centralization to attack all autonomous bodies clerics.
that in the past had placed limitations on the authority
of the monarchy and were therefore viewed by its advo- Economic recovery was noticeable, and government
cates as obstacles to progress. The church and its reli- efficiency greatly improved at the higher levels during
gious orders were the most important of these bodies. In Charles Ill's reign. The Bourbon reforms, however,
effect regalism combined an absolute monarchy with bu- made no basic changes in the pattern of property hold-
ing. Neither land reform nor an increase of land in use
reaucratic dictatorship. was accomplished. Creation of a middle-class movement
was hindered by the rudimentary nature of bourgeois
class consciousness in Spain. Despite the development of
a national bureaucracy in Madrid, government programs
foundered because of the lethargy and passive resistance
of administrators at lower levels as well as by a rural
population that remained wedded to aristocratic ideals.
The reform movement could not be sustained without
the patronage of Charles III and did not survive him.
Reform in general was cast in a suspicious light after the
outbreak of the French Revolution and was seen as for-

Charles III was the king of Spain Manuel de Godoy, the lover of
from 1759 to 1788. Queen Maria Louisa and a

close "friend" of King Charles

IV (1788-1808). He was

appointed Spanish premier in
1 792. The queen had hoped to

have Godoy made king on the
death of Charles III. who

objected, but she could not
overcome the royal line of

succession.

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 335

eign innovation hostile to Spanish traditions. The chaos Charles IV reigned from 1788 \(
of the next generation seemed to traditionalists to prove to 1808. He preferred hunting

the point. to ruling.

Spain joined France in aiding the fledgling United Queen Maria Louisa, wife of
Charles IV, was described by
AStates and declared war on Great Britain in 1779. Napoleon: "Maria Louisa has her
past and her character written on
two-year siege of Gibraltar failed, and the natural for- her face and it surpasses
tress remained in British hands. In the Treaty of Paris anything you dare imagine. " The
(1783), however, Spain recovered Florida, lost in 1763, queen had pronounced masculine
and Minorca.
features.
Charles IV (1788-1808) retained the trappings of his
father's enlightened despotism but was dominated by his Charles IV presiding over his court in 1804
wife's favorite, a guards officer, Manuel de Godoy, who
at the age of twenty-five was chief minister and virtual

dictator of Spain. When in 1792 the French National

Assembly demanded Spain's compliance with the family
pacts, Godoy rode the popular wave of reaction building
in Spain against the French Revolution and joined the
coalition against France. Spanish arms suffered repeated
setbacks, and in 1796 Godoy shifted allies and joined the
French against Great Britain. Promised half of Portugal
as his personal reward, Godoy became Napoleon Bona-

parte's willing puppet. Louisiana, Spanish since 1763,

Awas restored to France. regular subsidy was paid to

France from the Spanish treasury, and fifteen thousand
Spanish troops were assigned to garrisons in northern
Europe. Spain lost Trinidad to the British, saw its fleet
destroyed at Trafalgar (1805), and failed in another at-
tempt to seize Gibraltar.

With Godoy discredited, Napoleon in 1 807 demanded

Charles IV's abdication and forced his son and heir,
Ferdinand, to renounce his claim to the throne. Joseph
Bonaparte, Napoleon's brother, was named king of
Spain, and a large French army was moved in to support
the new government and to invade Great Britain's ally,
Portugal, from Spanish soil. The Bonapartist regime was
welcomed by the afrancesados, a small but influential

group of Spaniards who favored reconstructuring their

country on the French model.
In a move to ingratiate himself with the afrancesados,

Joseph Bonaparte proclaimed the dissolution of religious

houses. Defense of the Roman Catholic church, long
attacked by successive Spanish governments, now

became the test of Spanish patriotism and the cause

around which resistance to the French rallied. The War

of Independence (1808-14), as the Iberian phase of the

Napoleonic wars is known in Spanish historiography,

attained the status of a popular crusade that united all

classes, parties, and regions in a common struggle. It was

a war fought without rules or regular battlelines. The
brutality practiced on both sides was made vivid by the
Spanish painter Goya.

A British expeditionary force, originally intended to

occupy part of Spanish America, was dispatched to the
peninsula in 1808, followed the next year by a larger
contingent under Arthur Wellesley, later duke of Wel-
lington. Elements of the Spanish army held Cadiz, the

i
i

—

336 THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

The older brother of Napoleon. formed the majority in 1810, favored the Cortes, with its
Joseph Bonaparte, was made medieval origins, as a vehicle for returning Spain to the
king of Spain under the name of traditions it had cast away in the previous century. They
King Jose I and reigned from proposed, in effect, wiping out the eighteenth century
1808 to 1814. and restoring in a constitution the liberties of regional,
economic, and social associations that would prevent
Joseph Bonaparte's triumphant entry into Madrid in 1808 any one of them or the monarchy from becoming too
strong. The restoration of the liberties of the church and
only major city not taken by the French, but the country- the return of its property were other important aspects
of the Medievalist program.
side belonged to the guerrillas, who held down 250,000
The Constitution of 1812 provided for a limited mon-
of Napoleon's best troops under Marshal Nicolas Soult archy, a centralized administration, and a parliament to
while Wellington waited to launch the offensive that was which the government would be responsible. Suffrage
to cause the defeat of the French at Vitoria (1813). was limited by property qualifications favoring constit-
uencies where liberal sentiment was strongest. Individ-
THE LIBERAL ASCENDANCY ual liberties, the right to the free use of property among
them, were guaranteed. By Spanish standards it was a
A central junta sat in Cadiz. It had little actual authority,
revolutionary document.
except as surrogate for the absent royal government, but Ferdinand VII (reigned 1808, 1814-33) dismissed the
it did succeed in calling together representatives from
local juntas in 1810, with the vague notion of creating the Cadiz Cortes when he reassumed the throne, refusing to
Cortes of All the Spains, so called because it would be recognize the constitution drawn up by it. He was deter-
the single legislative body for the empire and its colonies. mined instead, to rule as an absolute monarch.

Many of the overseas provinces had by that time already Spain's American colonies took advantage of the post-
declared their independence. Some saw the Cortes at war chaos to proclaim their independence, and most had
established republican governments. By 1825 only Cuba
Cadiz as an interim government until the Desired One, and Puerto Rico remained under the Spanish flag in the
as Ferdinand VII was called by his supporters, could
New World. When Ferdinand was restored to Madrid,
return to the throne. Many regalists could not admit that
he expended wealth and manpower in a vain effort to
a parliamentary body could legislate in the absence of a
king. The two parties most in evidence at Cadiz, the reassert control over the colonies.
Medievalists and the Liberals, favored the continuance
of parliamentary government as provided for by a writ- In 1820 Major Rafael del Riego led a revolt among
ten constitution and the restoration of the monarchy
troops quartered in Cadiz while awaiting embarkation to
but for very different reasons. The Medievalists, who America. Garrison mutinies were not unusual, but Riego
issued a pronunciamento (declaration of principles) to
the troops, which was directed against the government
and called for the army to support adoption of the Con-
stitution of 1812. Support for Riego spread from garrison
to garrison, toppling the regalist government and forcing
Ferdinand to accept the liberal constitution. The pro-

nunciamento, distributed by barracks politicians among
underpaid members of an overstaffed officer corps,
became a regular feature of Spanish politics.

1 Ferdinand VII, who reigned in
1808 and then after Joseph
Napoleon, from 1814 to 1833.
made a most unusual
proclamation on March 29. 1830.

to the effect that the Salic Law
of 1 713 instituted by Philip V be

abolished. This action

reestablished that women had the
right to inherit the throne of

Spain.

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 337

Army support was required for any government to

survive and, if a pronunciamento received sufficient

backing, the government was well advised to defer to it.

This "referendum in blood" was considered within the

army to be the purest form of election because the sol-

diers supporting a pronunciamento were expressing their

—willingness to shed blood to make their point at least

in theory. In fact it was judged to have succeeded only

if the government gave in to it without a fight. If it did
not represent a consensus within the army and resistance

to it was offered, the pronunciamento was considered a

failure, and the officers who had proposed it dutifully

went into exile.

The three years of liberal government under the Con- Queen Isabella II as she appeared on assuming the throne ofSpain. She

stitution of 1812, called the Constitutional Triennium was ruler from 1833 to 1868. She followed the path of her father,

(1820-23), were brought to an abrupt close by French Ferdinand, one ofpursuing an administrative policy of military despo-
invervention ordered by Louis XVIII on an appeal from
tism and ranged to clerical absolutism. The queen was of loose morals

Ferdinand and with the assent of his conservative offi- and her children's legitimacy was in doubt. She even had a serious

cers. The arrival of the French was welcomed in many attempt made on her life in 1852 by a priest named Merino. Her life was

saved in the stabbing attempt by the whalebones in her corsets. She had

sectors. Ferdinand was restored as absolute monarch the priest "garroted and his body "
burned.

and chose his ministers from the ranks of the old afran-

cesados.

Ferdinand VII, a widower, was childless, and Don

Carlos, his popular, traditionalist brother, was heir pre-

sumptive. In 1829, however, Ferdinand married his

Neapolitan cousin Maria Cristina, who gave birth to a

daughter, an event followed closely by the revocation of

provisions prohibiting female succession. Ferdinand died

in 1833, leaving Maria Cristina as regent for their daugh-

ter, Isabella II (1833-68).

Don Carlos contested his niece's succession and won

the fanatical support of the traditionalists of Aragon and

of Basque Navarre. The Carlists held that legitimate

succession was possible only through the male line.

Agrarians, regionalists, and Catholics, they also opposed The marriage procession at the wedding of Isabella II. She married her
cousin Francis de Asis.
the middle-class, centralist, anticlerical Liberals who Queen Maria Christina, the wife ofFerdinand VII, after the king's death
turned to England and France, and the Quadruple Alliance ofApril 22,
flocked to support the regency. The Carlists fielded an 1834, to conclude with these states and Portugal that her daughter
army that held off government attempts to suppress Isabella II would be the ruler of Spain.

them for six years (1833-39), during which time Maria Queen Isabella with her son,
Don Alfonso, from a portrait by
Cristina received aid in arms and volunteers from Great
Winterhalter in the royal
ABritain. Carlist offensive against Madrid in 1837 palace

failed, but in the mountains the Basques continued to

resist until a compromise peace in 1839 recognized their

ancient fueros. Sentiment remained strong in Navarre

for Don Carlos and his successors, and the Carlists con-

tinued as a political force to be reckoned with. Carlist

uprisings occurred in 1847 and from 1872 to 1876.
The regency had come to depend on liberal support

within the army during the first Carlist war, but after the

end of the war against the traditionalists both the Liber-

als and the army tired of Maria Cristina. She was forced

to resign in 1 840, and responsibility for the regency was

taken over by a series of Liberal ministries.

The Liberals were a narrowly based elite. Their ab-

stract idealism and concern for individual liberties con-

trasted sharply with the paternalistic attitudes of Spain's

338 THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

rural society. There was no monolithic Liberal move- The queen Isabella in later life.
ment in Spain, but all factions were unified by their She was expelled to France in
anticlericalism, the touchstone of liberalism. Like the 1868 and died in 1904.

regalists of the previous century, nineteenth-century Lib- Amadeo, the duke ofAosta, second son of Italy's Vittorio Emanuele II,
erals held that no one within the state could exercise was offered the throne ofSpain and after accepting was given a tumultu-
authority independent of it, and hence no aspect of na- ous welcome when he arrived in Madrid.

tional life could be excluded from political concern. The delivered the vote for government candidates in return
state, they assumed, was the sum of the individuals living for patronage. The Progressives courted the Democrats
within it and could recognize and protect only the rights enough to be assured of regular inclusion in the govern-
ment. Relations with the church remained the most sen-
of individuals, not of corporate institutions, such as the sitive issue confronting the government and the most
church or universities, nor of the regions as separate divisive issue throughout the country. Despite their anti-
entities with distinct customs and interests. Because indi- clericalism, the Moderates concluded a rapprochement
viduals were subject to the law, only individuals could with the church, which agreed to surrender its claim to
confiscated property in return for official recognition by
hold title to land. As nothing should impede the develop- the state and a role in education. They looked in vain,
ment of the individual, so nothing should impede the however, to reconciliation with the church as a means of
winning conservative rural support.
state in guaranteeing the rights of the individual.
Liberals also agreed on the necessity for a written In 1868 Don Juan Prim, an army hero and popular

constitution, a parliamentary government, and a central- Progressive leader, was brought to power by an army
ized administration, as well as the need for laissez-faire revolt led by exiled officers determined to force Isabella
economics. All factions found a voice in the army and from the throne. Her abdication inaugurated a period of
drew leadership from its ranks. All had confidence that experimentation with a liberal monarchy, a federal
progress would follow naturally from the application of republic, and finally a military dictatorship.
Liberal principles. They differed, however, on the meth-
ods to be used in applying them. As prime minister, Prim canvassed Europe for a ruler

The Moderates saw economic development within a Ato replace Isabella. tentative offer made to a Hohen-
free market as the cure for political revolution. They
argued for a strong constitution that would spell out zollern prince was sufficient spark to set off the Franco-
guaranteed liberties. The Progressives, like the Moder- Prussian war (1870-71). Prim found a likely royal
ates, were members of the upper and middle classes, but
they drew support from the urban masses and favored candidate in Amadeo of Savoy, son of Victor Emmanuel
creation of a more broadly based electorate. They argued
that greater participation in the political process would II, king of Italy. Prim was assassinated shortly after
ensure economic development and an equitable distribu- Amadeo's arrival in Spain, leaving the new king without
tion of its fruits. Both factions were constitutional mon-
archists. The more radical Democrats, however,
countered that political freedom and economic liberal-

ism could only be achieved in a republic.

The Moderates, who dominated the new regency in

coalition with supporters of Isabella's succession, were
backed by the army and assured parliamentary majori-

ties by caciques, local political leaders who regularly

Marshal Juan Prim rallied the

patriots against the reactionary

party and the queen. This effort

by the Spanish Liberals resulted
in the dethronement and flight of

Isabella and her family in 1868.
Prim led a successful revolution

but fell victim to assassins in
1874.

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 339

Amadeo (Amadeus) I, king of a mentor and at the mercy of hostile politicians. The
constitution bequeathed to the new monarchy did not
Spain, 1871 to 1873, followed leave Amadeo sufficient powers to supervise the forma-
Isabella II to the throne. (There tion of a stable government and, mistrustful of Prim's
was a provisional government from
foreign prince, factional leaders refused to cooperate
1868 to 1871.) A serious attempt with or advise him. Deserted finally by the army,
on his life was made in 1872, and
he abdicated in 1873. He lived Amadeo abdicated, leaving a rump parliament to pro-

until 1890. claim Spain a federal republic.

The constitution of the First Republic (1873-74) pro-
vided for internally self-governing provinces bound to
the federal government by voluntary agreement. Juris-
diction over foreign and colonial affairs and defense was
reserved for Madrid. The federal Republic had four pres-

idents in its eight-month lifespan, none of whom could

find a prime minister to form a stable cabinet. The gov-
ernment could not decentralize quickly enough to satisfy
local radicals. Cities and provinces made unilateral dec-
larations of autonomy in imitation of the Paris Com-
mune. Madrid lost control of the country, and once
again the army stepped in to rescue the "national

Ahonor." national government taking the form of a

unitary republic briefly served as the transparent disguise
for an interim military dictatorship.

King Alfonso XII was proclaimed king ofSpain on December 29, 1874, THE CONSTITUTIONAL
by General Martinez Campos, the top military leader, who was an
adherent of the overturned Bourbon Dynasty. At the time, Alfonso was MONARCHY
living in Paris with his mother, the ex-queen Isabella II. Alfonso XII
arrived in Madrid on January 14, 1875, at the head of the government It required no more than a brigadier's pronunciamento
troops, and although not yet eighteen years ofage, he took over the reins to restore the Bourbon monarchy, calling Isabella's son,
of government the able, British-educated Alfonso XII to the throne
(1874-86). Alfonso identified himself as "Spaniard,
Catholic, and Liberal," and his succession was greeted
with a degree of relief even by supporters of the Repub-

lic. He cultivated good relations with the army (Alfonso
was a cadet at Sandhurst when summoned to Spain),

which removed itself from politics, content that a stable,
popular civilian government was being provided. Al-
fonso insisted that the church be confirmed constitution-

ally in its official status, thus assuring the restored

monarchy of conservative support.

Alfonso XII brought the unrest of Alfonso XII in the robes of the
Spain to an end by 1876. He Order of the Golden Fleece

married twice. His first wife was
his cousin, Marie de las

Mercedes, daughter of the Duke
de Montpensier; and his second

wife, Maria Christina,
archduchess of Austria, was the

mother of Alfonso XIII.

340 THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

King Alfonso XIII and his queen visit the royal family in Belgium. Queen Regent Maria Christina
Standing, left to right: Prince Leopold and King Albert ofBelgium, and (1886-1902) and Alfonso XIII
King Alfonso. Seated, left to right: the queens of Spain and Belgium.

Queen Maria Christina

The royal palace in Madrid where the queen lived with the young king
Alfonso XIII

King Alfonso XIII in his first
royal military uniform

The birth of Alfonso XIII is announced to the awaiting statesmen. His
father having died in 1885, Alfonso XIII became king at birth.

The young king Alfonso XIII

—horseback riding Air

favorite sport

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 341

In its political provisions the new constitution was The coronation of King Alfonso XIII
consciously modeled on British practices. The new gov-
ernment used electoral manipulation to construct and Alfonso XIII with his queen riding in a carriage in spite of the many
threats of assassination plots to kill him during this exposure to all
maintain a two-party system in parliament, but the result
elements of the public. Note the miniature royal crown on the queen's
was more a parody than an imitation. Conservatives and head.
Liberals exchanged control of government at regular in-
tervals after general elections. Once again the elections King Alfonso XIII as he
were controlled at the constituency level by caciques appeared later in life
who delivered the vote to one party or the other as
directed in return for the assurance of patronage from Queen Victoria Eugenia, the
whichever was scheduled to win. Considering Spain's consort of King Alfonso XIII,
turbulent political history through the first three-quar- was the grandmother of King
ters of the century, it was a remarkable example of com-
promise and restraint. Juan Carlos I.

Alfonso XIII (1886-1931) was the posthumous son of
Alfonso XII. His mother, another Maria Cristina, acted
as regent until her son came officially of age in 1902.
(Alfonso XIII abdicated in 1931.)

Emigration to Cuba from Spain was heavy in the nine-
teenth century, and the Cuban middle class, among

whom ties to the mother country were strong, favored

keeping Cuba Spanish. Cuba had experienced periodic
uprisings by independence movements since 1868.
Successive governments in Madrid were committed to
maintaining whatever armed forces were necessary to
combat insurgency. Hostilities were renewed in 1895,
supported clandestinely from the United States, and re-

quired Spain's sending substantial reinforcements under
General Valerio Weyler. Public opinion in the United
States was stirred by reports of his suppression of the
independence movement, and the mysterious explosion
of the battleship U.S.S. Maine in Havana harbor led to
a declaration of war by the United States in April 1898.
Antiquated Spanish naval units were destroyed at San-

tiago de Cuba and in Manila Bay. Despite a pledge by
Madrid to defend Cuba "to the last peseta," the Spanish
army surrendered after a few weeks of hostilities against
an American expeditionary force. At Paris in September
Spain gave up Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines.

The suddenness and the totality of Spain's defeat and
the realization of its lack of support during the war with
the United States (only Germany had offered diplomatic

backing) threw the country into despair.

The traumatic events of 1 898 and the inability of the
government to deal with them prompted political reeval-
uation. Solutions were sought by a plethora of new per-
sonalist parties, most of them short-lived, and by
regional groupings on both the left and the right that
broke the hegemony of the two-party system and ulti-
mately left the parliamentary structure in disarray. By
1915 it was virtually impossible to form a coalition gov-
ernment that could command the support of a parlia-
mentary majority.

Spain was neutral in World War I, but the Spanish

army was constantly engaged from 1909 to 1926 against

Abd al-Krim's Riff Berbers in Morocco, where Spain

—

342 THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

REPUBLICAN SPAIN

An early picture of Don Juan, Antimonarchist parties won a substantial vote in the

the third son of King Alfonso 1931 municipal elections. Alfonso XIII interpreted the
XIII. In 1969, when Franco
designated Juan Carlos as his elections and the riots that had acclaimed their results as

successor, the senior pretender, an indication of imminent civil war, and he left the coun-

Don Juan, had not yet given up try with his family, appealing to the army for support in

his claim to the throne. upholding the monarchy. When General Jose Sanjurjo,

had joined France in proclaiming a protectorate. Succes- army chief of staff, replied that the armed forces would
sive civilian governments in Spain allowed the war to
continue but refused to supply the army with the means not support the king against the will of the people, Al-
to win it. Spanish losses were heavy to an enemy that was
fierce, skillful, and equipped with superior weapons. Ri- fonso abdicated.
ots against conscription for the African war spread disor-
der throughout the country, and opposition to the war A multiparty coalition in which regional parties held

was often expressed in church burning. Officers, who the balance met at a constitutional convention at San

often had served in Morocco, formed juntas to register Sebastian, the summer capital, to proclaim the Second
complaints that were just short of pronunciamentos
against wartime inflation, low-fixed salaries for the mili- Republic. The convention set as the goals of the new
tary, alleged civilian corruption, and inadequate and
scarce equipment. Republic to reform the army, to grant regional auton-

Conditions in Morocco, increased anarchist and Com- omy, to carry through social reform and economic redis-

munist terrorism, industrial unrest, and the effects of the tribution, to separate church and state, and to deprive
postwar economic slump prompted the pronunciamento
that brought a general officer, Miguel Primo de Rivera, the church of a role in education. Niceto Alcala Zamora,
to power in 1923. His authoritarian regime originally
a nonparty conservative, was named president and called
enjoyed wide support in much of the country, and he had
elections for June.
the confidence of the king and the loyalty of the army,
but the regime was without an ideological foundation. Its The first general election of the Second Republic gave
mandate was based on the general disillusionment with
the parliamentary government and the divisiveness a majority to a coalition of Left Republicans, middle-
caused by partisan party politics.
class Radicals led by Manuel Azana, who became prime
Primo de Rivera's government sponsored public
works to curb unemployment. Protectionism and state minister, and labor leader Francisco Largo Caballero's
control of the economy led to a temporary economic
Socialists, backed by the UGT. Azana's government was
Arecovery. better led and better supplied army brought
pledged to the gradual introduction of socialism through
the African war to a successful conclusion in 1926.
The precipitous economic decline in 1930 undercut the democratic process. His gradualism alienated the

support for the government from special-interest groups. political left; his socialism, the right.

For seven years Primo de Rivera had remained a man on Azana's greatest difficulties derived from doctrinal
horseback. He had established no new system of govern-
differences within the government between his non-
ment to replace parliamentary government. Criticism
from academics mounted. Bankers expressed disappoint- Marxist, bourgeois Republicans and the Socialists, who
ment at the state loans that his government had tried to
after an initial period of cooperation obstructed Azaha
float. An attempt to reform the promotion system cost
at every step. Attempts at labor legislation were blocked
—him the support of the army which, in turn, lost him
by opposition from the UGT. The Socialists complained
the support of the king. Primo de Rivera resigned and
that Azana's reforms were inadequate to produce mean-
died shortly after in exile.
ingful social changes, though there was no parliamentary

majority that would have approved Largo Caballero's

proposals. If Azana's legislative program did not satisfy

his ally, it did rally moderate and conservative opinion

against the coalition on the eve of the second general

election in November 1932.
Azana's principal parliamentary opposition came

frbm the two largest parties that could claim a national

constituency, Lerroux's moderate, middle-class Radical

Republicans and the right-wing Catholic organization,

the Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right
(Confederation Espaiiola de Derechas Auton6mas
CEDA). Lerroux, who had grown more conservative

and tolerant than in his days as an antimonarchist fire-

brand, capitalized on the left's failure to reach a compro-

mise with the church or to deal with industrial unrest

and the extragovernmental power of the UGT and CNT.

CEDAPresident Zamora was hostile to and urged Ler-

roux to head a minority government, which he did for

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 343

more than a year before entering into a parliamentary a civil war as the appointment of the CEDA-dominated
government that Zamora had worked to prevent.
alliance with CEDA. The center-right coalition was not
The general election produced a number of irregulari-
welcomed by Lerroux, but it was the only means by ties that led the left, right, and center to claim voting
which a parliamentary majority that included his party
could be obtained. Gil Robles was appointed minister for fraud on a massive scale. Two subsequent runoff votes,
war, with a role in maintaining public order, in the new
government. recounts, and an electoral commission controlled by the
left provided the Popular Front with an impressive num-
The unions used the strike as a political weapon much ber of parliamentary seats. Azaha formed his minority
as the army used the pronunciamento. Industrial disor- government, but the front's victory was taken as the
signal for the start of the left's long-awaited revolution,
der climaxed in the miners' strike in Asturias, which already anticipated by street riots, church burnings, and
Azana openly and actively supported. The miners were strikes. Parallel governments were set up by workers'
councils, which undertook to circumvent the slow-grind-
crushed by the police and army commanded by Fran- ing wheels of the constitutional process. Zamora was
cisco Franco. The strike confirmed to the right that the removed from office on the grounds that he had gone
beyond his constitutional authority in calling the general
left could not be trusted to abide by constitutional pro- election. Azana was named to replace him, depriving the
cesses, and the suppression of the strike proved to the left Left Republicans of his strong leadership.
that the right was "Fascist." Azana accused Gil Robles
of using Republican institutions to destroy the Republic. THE SPANISH CIVIL WAR

The Lerroux-Gil Robles government had as its first Gil Robles' influence waned as a spokesman for the right

priority the restoration of order, although its existence in the new parliament. CEDA's role was assumed by the
was the chief excuse for the disorder. Action on labor's
legitimate grievances was postponed until order was re- National Block, a smaller coalition of monarchists and

stored. The most controversial of Gil Robles' programs, Fascists led by Jose Calvo Sotelo, who had sought the
however, was finding the means to effect a reconciliation
army's cooperation in restoring Alfonso XIII. Calvo
with the church. Within the context of the coalition with
Lerroux, he also attempted to expand his political base Sotelo, who had been eloquent in opposition in the open-
by courting the support of anti-Republican elements. ing sessions of the new parliament, was murdered in July

The government resigned in November 1935 over a mi- 1936, supposedly in retaliation for the killing of a police
nor issue. Zamora refused to sanction the formation of officer by Fascists. Calvo Sotelo's death was a signal to

a new government by CEDA, without whose cooper- the army to act, on the pretext that the civilian govern-
ation no moderate government could be put together. On ment had allowed the country to fall into disorder, which

the advice of the left, Zamora called a new general elec- Aon the face of it was true. pronunciamento was issued.
A coup was expected, however, and revolts by army
tion for February.
In polarizing public opinion the Asturian miners' garrisons in Madrid and Barcelona were beaten down by
the urban police and workers' militia loyal to the govern-
strike had consolidated the parties on the left from Aza- ment. Navy crews spontaneously purged their ships of
na's Republicans to the Communist Party of Spain (Par- officers. The eleventh-hour efforts of Indalecio Prieto,
tido Comunista de Espaha). The Socialists had been who had succeeded Azana as prime minister, to arrive at
increasingly "bolshevized," and it was difficult for a So- a compromise were rejected both by the army and by the
cial Democrat such as Largo Caballero to control his
party in its leftward drift. In 1935 Stalin had sanctioned left.
Communist participation in popular front governments
with bourgeois and Democratic Socialist parties. The The army was most successful in the north. Old Cas-
success of Leon Blum, the French Socialist leader, in tile, Leon, and the Carlist strongholds in Navarre and
bringing the Popular Front to power in France had con- Aragon rallied to the army. In Morocco elite units seized
ferred respectability on the project. The Left Republi- control under Franco, Spain's youngest general and a
cans, the Socialists, the Catalan Left (Esquerra hero of the Riff campaigns, where he had commanded
Catalana), the Communists, a number of smaller re-
the Foreign Legion. Franco's African army, including
gional and left-wing parties, and the Anarchists, who Moorish auxiliaries, were ferried to Andalusia on trans-

had boycotted previous elections as a matter of principle, port supplied by Germany and Italy. Franco occupied
the major cities in the south before turning toward Ma-
joined to present a single leftist slate to the electorate. drid to link up with Mola, who was advancing from
In contrast to Blum's experiment in France, however, Burgos. The reliefjaf the army garrison besieged in the
Alcazar at Toledo, however, delayed the attack on Ma-
the Spanish Popular Front was to be an electoral coali-
tion only. Its goal was not to form a government but to drid and allowed time for a preparation of the defense of

defeat the right. Largo Caballero made it clear that the the capital. Army units penetrated the city limits but
Socialists would not cooperate in any government that
did not adopt their program for nationalization, a policy
as much guaranteed to break Spain in two and provoke

—

344 THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

The dictator. Francisco Franco a number of armed forces cadres had remained loyal,
especially in the air force and navy. Many officers who
were driven back on the grounds of the University of were loyal were either purged or not trusted to hold
Madrid. command positions. The brunt of the fighting in the early
months of the civil war was borne by the workers' militia
A junta of generals, Franco included, formed a gov- and independently organized armed political units like

ernment at Burgos that was immediately recognized by those of the Trotskyite Workers' Party of Marxist Unifi-

Germany and Italy. Sanjurjo, who had been expected to cation (Partido Obrero de Unification Marxista
lead the army movement, was killed in a plane crash
POUM), described by George Orwell in Homage to
during the first days of the uprising. In October 1936
Catalonia. The army garrison in Barcelona, for instance,
Franco was named head of state, with the rank of genera-
lissimo and the title el caudillo (the leader). UGThad been crushed by the anarchist militia and the

Franco, who did not have a reputation as a political Assault Guards, the urban police corps established by

soldier, had opposed Sanjurjo in 1932, but Azaiia had the Republic to counterbalance the Civil Guard
considered him unreliable and made him captain general
of the Canaries, virtual exile for an ambitious officer. (Guardia Civil), the paramilitary rural police, generally
Though by nature a conservative, Franco was not wed-
considered reactionary. Advisers, logistics experts, and
ded to any political creed. He set about reconciling all some field-grade officers were provided by Moscow. For-

right-wing, anti-Republican groups in one Nationalist eign volunteers, including more than two thousand from

organization. The catalyst was provided by the Falange, the United States, formed the International Brigade. The
a Fascist party founded by Jose Antonio Primo de Riv- Communists pressed for and won approval for the cre-
era, the dictator's son. The Carlists, revived after 1931,
merged with the Falange in 1937, but the association was ation of a national, conscript Republican army.

never harmonious. Jose Antonio's execution by the Re- Nationalist strength was based on the regular army,

publicans provided the Falange with a martyr. The more which included large contingents of Moroccan troops
radical of the early Falange programs were pushed aside,
and the syndicalism adopted by the Nationalists was and the battalions of the Foreign Legion, which Franco
only a shadow of what Jose Antonio had intended, but
had commanded in Africa. The Carlists, who had always
the Nationalist organization kept its Fascist facade.
Franco's strength, however, lay in the army. maintained a clandestine military organization (re-

Nationalist strategy called for separating Madrid from quetes) and some of whom had received training in Italy,
Catalonia, which was firmly Republican, and from Va-
lencia and Murcia, which the Republic also controlled. were among Franco's most effective troops and were
The Republicans stabilized the front around Madrid, employed with the Moroccans as a shock corps. More
defending it against the Nationalists for three years. Iso-
lated Asturias and Vizcaya, where the newly organized than fifty thousand Italian "volunteers," most of them
Basque Republic fought to defend its autonomy without army conscripts, were dispatched to Spain by Mussolini,
assistance from Madrid, fell to Franco in October 1937.
Otherwise the battlelines were static until July 1938, along with air and naval units. The German Condor
when Nationalist forces broke through to the Mediter- Legion, made infamous by the bombing of Guernica,
ranean Sea south of Barcelona. Throughout the civil war
the industrial areas, Asturias and the Basque provinces provided air support for the Nationalists and tested the
excepted, remained in Republican hands while the chief
food-producing areas were under Nationalist control. tactics and equipment used a few years later by the Luft-

The Republic lacked a regular trained army, though waffe.

A nonintervention commission, including representa-

tives from France, Great Britain, Germany, and Italy,
was established at the Lyon Conference in 1936 to stem

the flow of supplies to both sides. France and Great

Britain were concerned that escalating foreign interven-

tion not turn Spain's civil war into a European war.

Largo Caballero, who became prime minister in Sep-

tember 1936, had the support of the Socialists and of the

Communists, who were becoming the most important
political factor in the Republican government. The Com-

munists, after successfully arguing for a national con-

script army that could be directed by the government,
pressed for elimination of the militia units. They also

argued for postponing the revolution until the Fascists

had been defeated and encouraged greater participation

by the bourgeois parties in the Popular Front. The UGT,
increasingly under Communist influence, was brought

into the government, and the more militant elements

within it were purged. POUM, which had resisted dis-

banding its independent military units and merging with
the Communist-controlled national army, was ruthlessly

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 345

suppressed as the Communists undertook to eliminate Franco prepared for the likelihood of postwar criti-
competing leftist organizations. Anarchists were dealt cism of his regime by reinstituting the Cortes in 1943,
with in similar fashion, and in Catalonia a civil war was though not as an elected legislature, and by providing a

fought within a civil war. constitution in 1945.
Fearing the growth of Soviet influence in Spain, Largo Stalin proposed an attack against Spain, the last Fas-

Caballero attempted to negotiate a compromise that cist stronghold, after Germany's defeat, but his sugges-
tions were rejected by Winston Churchill and Franklin
would end the civil war. He was removed from office and
D. Roosevelt. At the conclusion of World War II the
replaced by Juan Negrin Lopez, a pro-Communist So- United Nations bound its members to observe diplo-
cialist with little previous political experience.
matic and economic sanctions against Spain, and for
The Republican army, its attention diverted by inter-
nal political battles, brave but often poorly led, was never several years Spain was ostracized by the world commu-
able to mount a sustained counteroffensive or to exploit
a breakthrough such as that on the Ebro in 1938. Negrin nity.
Lopez realized that the war could not be won by Span-
iards in Spain, but he hoped to prolong the fighting until The United States resumed the exchange of ambassa-
the outbreak of a European war, which he thought immi- dors with Madrid in 1951, and an agreement calling for
the establishment of American air and naval bases in
nent. Spain was concluded in 1953. Efforts to include Spain in
the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) were
Barcelona fell to the Nationalists in January 1939, and vetoed by the Western European members, whose official

Valencia, the temporary capital, in March. When fac- attitudes toward Spain remain cool.
tional fighting broke out in Madrid among its defenders,
the Republican army commander seized control of what THE MONARCHY RETURNS

remained of the government and surrendered to the Na- Spain was proclaimed a monarchy without a king in
tionalists on the last day of March, thus ending the civil
1957. Don Juan de Borbon y Battenberg, the heir of
FRANCOS SPAIN

Although Franco made no secret of his Axis sympathies
in the early years of World War II and was a signatory

of the Anti-Comintern Pact, he kept Spain neutral. Hit-
ler attempted to encourage more active cooperation from
Franco at their one meeting at Hendaye on the French

border in 1941, but Franco was determined to make no

commitments.

Juan Carlos was always a very popular person with the Spanish people.

He is seen here arriving in Madrid in 1955 for a royalist demonstration.

Juan Carlos Victor Maria de Borbon y Borbon was born at 1:05 p.m. on

January 5, 1938, at the Anglo-American Hospital in Rome. He was the
first son of Don Juan de Borbon y Battenberg and Dona Maria de las

—Mercedes de Borbon y Orleans, and consequently the grandson of King

Alfonso XIII and Queen Victoria Eugenie the granddaughter of

—Queen Victoria ofEngland on hisfather s side, and ofthe Infante Don

Carlos de Borbon and the Infanta Dona Luisa de Orleans on his moth-

er's side.

The two dynastic branches that had been separate since the death of
Ferdinand VII have come together once more in his person, "through the
design of Providence, " as Juan Carlos himself was to proclaim on July
23, 1969, at the ceremony of his oath-taking as successor to the office
of head of state as king.

A few hours after his birth, he was baptized in the church of the

Masters Palace of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, by the then
secretary of state of the Vatican, Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, who a year
later was to become pope under the name of Pius XII.

Finally, by virtue ofthe Law ofSuccession dated July 26, 1947, Prince
Juan Carlos de Borbon y Borbon was designated successor as king on

July 22, 1969, with a view to his ascending the throne in due course. This
actually took place on November 22, 1975.

346 THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

Alfonso XIII, was considered too liberal and was re- In May 1962 Prince Juan Carlos married Princess Sophia of Greece. In
moved from the line of succession, but in 1969 his son,
this photograph of the ceremony King Paul of Greece (1947-64). the
Don Juan Carlos de Borbon y Borbon, groomed by father of the bride, appears to the left, and behind Sophia is her brother
Franco to assume the monarchy, was named to succeed Constantine. who became the king of Greece (1964-73).

to the throne. Prince Juan Carlos, upon being named

heir to the throne, swore to uphold the principles of the
National movement, Franco's umbrella political orga-
nization. Franco had taken an active interest in the
prince's education, making certain that Juan Carlos at-

—tended the three military academies army, navy, and
—air force as well as the University of Madrid. After

formal schooling the prince was assigned at various

times to positions in the different ministries in order to
learn government operation firsthand.

Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco, a longtime confidant of
Franco's, replaced the aging dictator as head of govern-
ment in 1973 and was considered to be Franco's hand-
picked political successor. Carrero Blanco was
assassinated in 1974 by Basque terrorists. In the cabinet
reshuffle that followed the appointment of his successor,
former security chief Carlos Arias Navarro, Opus Dei
ministers were dropped. During Franco's illness in the
summer of 1974 and the fall of 1975, Prince Juan Carlos
assumed temporarily the duties of the head of state.
Franco died November 20, 1975, and Prince Juan Carlos
became the king of Spain, returning the monarchy to

control of the country.

fr\«~-^
,

King Juan Carlos I is Up to the present time, the king and queen of Spain have had three

commemorated on many children:
stamps in his country and its
The Infanta Doha Elena. She was born on December 20. 1963. at the
possessions. Nuestra Sehora de Loreto Hospital in Madrid The christening took
place at the Zarzuela Palace on December 27. The godparents were the
On September 13. 1961. Juan Carlos 's engagement to Princess Sophia, countess of Barcelona and the Infante Don Alfonso of Orleans.
the daughter of King Paul I and Queen Fredericka of Greece was
announced. She was born on November 2. 1938, in Athens, and in her The Infanta Doha Cristina. She was born at the same hospital as her
family tree there are two German emperors, eight kings ofDenmark, five sister, on June 13. 1965. and was also christened at the Zarzuela Palace,
kings of Sweden, seven czars of Russia, one king and one queen of on June 21. Her godparents were the Infanta Maria Cristina, countess
Norway, one queen of England, and five kings of Greece.
of Marone; and Don Alfonso de Borbon Dampierre.
The wedding took place in Athens on May 14. 1962. The marriage,
The Infante Don Felipe. He was born on January 30. 1968. at the
for which the Latin Catholic rite was used, took place at the Catholic same hospital as his sisters. The king and queen 's first son, Felipe Juan
church of Saint Dionysius, and was followed by an Orthodox ceremony
Pablo Alfonso de Todos los Santos Borbon Schleswig-Holstein Bourbon
at the Metropolitan Church for civil purposes. More than a half million Sonderburg-Glucksburg, is the rightful heir to all his fathers titles of
people cheered the bride and groom through the streets of the Greek nobility and will eventually succeed him as head of slate and king. At
capital. The marriage ceremony was attended by 137 kings and prin- his christening which took place on February 8. his godparents were Don
cesses from different countries. Juan de Borbon, count ofBarcelona; and Queen Victoria Eugenia, who,
after thirty-one years ' absence, had set foot on Spanish soil once more

for this purpose.

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 347

A stamp honoring the crown prince Felipe (Philip) and future king of

Spain

\ In 1976, the king and queen visited the United Nations headquarters in

mi New York City. Left to right: Mrs. Kurt Waldheim, King Juan Carlos,

Secretary-General Waldheim, and Queen Sophia.

LL/ I Corrtot sty \

;

Spain in its geographic setting today

*v^J

l^ ^

sfiana o u y 8 <9
LL/ I Con
*
wwwmww************ i
.%aM//
CTenuuiJcl'ff

fynana $2 i y&ndttci 15 t
Cl/ / llv/ViV
<<'A7 %s/iana 20

\

-tifirUS.W Chum /( .'//til1

a*

25: Sf,j//i//7i7

AA4J

Recent rulers ofSpain commemorated in a special series ofstamps. Left,
top to bottom: Philip V (1701-24), Charles IV (1788-1808), and Al-
fonso XII (1874-86). Center, top to bottom: Luis I (1724), Ferdinand
VI (1746-59), Ferdinand VII (1808), and Alfonso XIII (1886-1931).
And right, top to bottom: Charles III (1 759-88), Isabella II (1833-68).
and Juan Carlos I (1975- ).

MR THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

THE ROYAL SOVEREIGNS OF THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

Reign Title Ruler Birth Death Relationship

—206 B.C.-A.D. 411 Under control of Romans VISIGOTHIC RULE 415 Son of Abder Rahman I
—41 1 Spain conquered by Visigoths 417 Son of Hisham I
451 Son of Hakam I
412-415 King Ataulphus (Atauf) (Ataulfo) 456 Son of Abder Rahman II
415-417 King Wallia 484 Son of Mohammed I
417-451 King Theodoric 507 Son of Mondhir
451-456 King Theodoric II 531 Grandson of Abdallah
466-484 King Euric (Eurico) 554 Son of Abder Rahman HI
484-507 King Alaric (Alarico) 567 Son of Hakam 11
508-531 King Amalaric (Amalarico) 571
531-554 King Theudes 572
554-567 King Athanagild (Athanagildo) 586
567-571 King Theodomir 601
571-572 King Leuva 612
572-586 King Leuvigild (Leovigildo) 621
586-601 King Recared (Recaredo) (Reccaredo) 631
601-612 King Sisebut (Sisebert) 640
612-621 King Recared II (Recaredo) (Reccaredo) 642
621-631 King 653
631-640 King Swintilla (Suintila) 672
640-642 King Sisenando 680
642-653 King Tulga 687
653-672 King 702
672-680 King Chindaswind (Cindasuinto) 709
680-687 King Recceswinth (Recesuinto) 711
687-702 King
702-709 King Wamba 717
709-711 King 719
Euric (Ervigius) 732
Ergica
Witiza 788
Roderic (Rodrigo) 799
822
MOORISH AMIRATE 852
886
711-714 Amir Tank and Musa 888
714-717 Amir 912
718-719 Amir Abdelaziz
730-732 Amir Alhor 961
Abderraman of Gafeki 976
1016
AMIRS OF CORDOVA 1008
1017
756-788 Amir Abder Rahman I 731 1016
788-799 Amir Hisham I 742 1017
799-822 Amir Hakam I 760 1021
822-852 Amir Abder Rahman II 788 1022
852-886 Amir Mohammed I 816 1022
886-888 Amir Mondhir 844 1023
888-912 Amir 868 1024
Abdallah 1027
1031
CALIPHS OF CORDOVA

912-961 Caliph Abder Rahman III (Abderraman) 891
961-976 Caliph Hakam II (Alhaken) 913
976-1008 Caliph Hisham II (Hixen) 975
1008-1008 Caliph Mohammed II 976
1009-1009 Caliph Suleyman 980
1010-1012 Caliph Hisham II (rethroned)
1012-1017 Caliph Suleyman (rethroned) 980
1017-1021 Caliph Ali bin Hamoud
1021-1022 Caliph Abder Rahman IV
1022-1022 Caliph
1022-1023 Caliph Aicasim
1023-1024 Caliph
1024-1027 Caliph Abder Rahman V
1027-1031 Caliph Mohammed III

Yahya bin Ali
Hisham III

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 349

Reign Title Ruler Birth Death Relationship

1067-1107 Sultan SULTANS OF ALMORAVIDE 1107
1107-1144 Sultan 1144
1144-1147 Sultan Yousouf bin Teshonfin 1147
Ali bin Yousouf
Teshoufin bin Ali

1147-1163 Sultan SULTANS OF ALMOHADE 1163
1163-1178 Sultan 1178
1178-1199 Sultan Abd el-Moulmin 1199
1199-1213 Sultan Yousouf abou Yacoub 1213
1213-1223 Sultan Yacoub bin Yousouf 1223
1223-1225 Sultan Mohammed bin Yacoub 1225
1225-1238 Sultan Abou Yacoub 1238
Abou Malik
Mamoun

1238-1273 King KINGS OF GRANADA
1273-1303 King
1303-1309 King Mahommed I
1309-1312 King Mahommed II
1312-1325 King Mahommed III
1325-1333 King
1333-1354 King Nazal
1354-1359 King Ismail I
1359-1361 King
1361-1361 King Mahommed IV
1361-1391 King
1391-1396 King Youcef I
1396-1408 King
1408-1425 King Mahommed V
1425-1427 King
1427-1427 King Ismail II
1427-1431 King
1431-1431 King Abou-Said
1432-1445 King
1445-1454 King Mahommed V (rethroned)
1454-1456 King
1456-1482 King Youcef II
1482-1492 King
Mahommed VI

Youcef III

Mahommed VII
Mahommed VIII
Mahommed VII (rethroned)
Ebn Alhamar
Mahommed VII (rethroned)
Ebn Ostman
Ebn Ismail

Moulay Hacen
Abou Abdilehi (Boabdil)

CHRISTIAN KINGS

KINGS OF ASTURIAS

718-737 King Pelayo 848 842
737-739 King Favila 850 Son of Bermudo I
739-757 King Alfonso I, the Catholic 866 Son of Ramiro I
757-768 King Fruela I 912
768-774 King Aurelio (Aurelius)
774-783 King
783-788 King Silo
788-791 King
791-842 King Mauregato the Usurper
842-850 King Bermudo I, the Deacon (Veremund)
850-866 King Alfonso II, the Chaste
866-910 King Ramiro I
Ordono I
910-914 King Alfonso III, the Great
914-924 King
924-925 King KINGS C

Garcia 914 Son of Alfonso III
924
Ordono II 925

Fruela II

1 Title Ruler Birth Death THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN

350 King Alfonso IV, the Monk Relationship
King
Reign King Ramiro II 930 Son of Ramiro II
King Ordono III 950 Brother of Ordono III
925-930 King Sancho I, the Fat 956 Son of Sancho I
930-950 King Ramiro III 967 Son of Ordono III
950-956 King Bcrmudo II 982
956-967 King Alfonso V, the Noble 999
967-982 Bermundo III 1027
982-999 1037
999-1027
1027-1037

KINGS OF LEON AND CASTILE

1037-1065 King Ferdinand I, the Great 1030 1065 Son of Sancho III ot 1
1065-1072 King Sancho II 1081 1072 Son of Ferdinand I
1072-1109 King Alfonso VI 1106 1109 Son of Sancho II
1109-1126 Queen Urraca 1126 Daughter of Alfonso VI
1126-1157 King Alfonso VII, the Emperor 1157 Son of Urraca

KINGS OF LEON

1157-1188 King Ferdinand II 1188 Son of Alfonso VII
1188-1230 King Alfonso IX 1230 Son of Ferdinand II

KINGS OF CASTILE

1157-1158 King Sancho III 1155 1158 Son of Alfonso VII
1158-1214 King Alfonso VIII 1202 1214 Son of Sancho HI
1214-1217 King Henry I 1217 Son of Alfonso VIII
1217-1217 Queen Berangaha 1199 Mother of Ferdinand III
1217-1252 King Ferdinand HI, the Saint 1225 1252 Son of Alfonso IX of Leon
1252-1284 King Alfonso X, the Wise 1258 1284 Son of Ferdinand III
1284-1295 King Sancho IV 1285 1295
1295-1312 King Ferdinand IV 1310 1312 Son of Alfonso X
1312-1350 King Alfonso XI 1334 1350
1350-1369 King Pedro I, the Cruel 1333 1369 Son of Sancho IV
1369-1379 King Henry II 1358 1379 Son of Ferdinand IV
1379-1390 King John I 1379 1390 Son of Alfonso XI
1390-1406 King Henry III 1405 1406 Brother of Pedro I
1406-1454 King John II 1425 1454 Son of Henry II
1454-1474 King Henry IV 1474 Son of John I
Son of Henry 111
1054 Son of John II
1094
KINGS OF NAVARRE 1150
1194
840-85 King Inigo Arista 1234
1253
905-925 King Sancho Garces 1270
1274
925-970 King Garcia Sanchez I 1305
1316
970-994 King Sancho Abarca 1322
1328
994-1000 King Garcia Sanchez II 1349
1387
1000-1035 King Sancho the Great 1425

1035-1054 King Garcia Sanchez HI 1479
1481
1076-1094 King Sancho HI Ramirez (Sancho I of Aragon)

1134-1150 King Garcia Ramirez IV

1150-1194 King Sancho V, the Wise

1194-1234 King Sancho VI, the Strong

1234-1253 King Teobaldo I

1253-1270 King Teobaldo II

1270-1274 King Henry I

1274-1305 Queen Juana I

1305-1316 King Luis Hutfn

1316-1322 King Philip

1322-1328 King Charles 1

1328-1349 Queen Juana II

1349-1387 King Charles 11, the Bad

1387-1425 King Charles III, the Noble

1425-1479 Queen Blanca and

King Don John

1479-1479 Queen Leonor

1479-1481 Kin^: 1 run cisco Febo

1481-1512 Queen Catalina (and Don John of Aragon)

1512— Joined with Cistile and Aragon

THE KINGDOMS OF SPAIN 351

Reign Title Ruler Birth Death Relationship

1035-1065 King KINGS OF ARAGON 1065
1065-1094 King 1094
1094-1104 King Ramiro I 1104 Brother of Alfonso I
1104-1134 King Sancho Ramirez 1034
1134-1137 King Pedro I 1137 Son of Ramon Berenguer IV
1137-1162 Queen Alfonso I, the Fighter 1162
1162-1196 King Ramiro II, the Monk 1196 Son of Alfonso II
1196-1213 King 1213 Son of Pedro II
1213-1276 King Petronilla 1236 Son of James I
1276-1285 King Alfonso II 1285 Son of Pedro III
1285-1291 King Pedro II 1291 Brother of Alfonso III
1291-1327 King 1327
1327-1336 King James I, the Conqueror 1336 Son of Alfonso rv
1336-1387 King Pedro III, the Great 1387 Son of Pedro IV
1387-1395 King Alfonso III 1395 Brother of John I
1395-1410 King James II 1410 Brother of John II of Castile
1412-1416 King Alfonso IV 1416 Son of Ferdinand I
1416-1458 King Pedro IV, the Ceremonious 1458
1458-1479 King John I 1452 1479
1479-1516 King Martin I, the Humane 1516
Ferdinand I
Alfonso V, the Magnanimous 1558
John II 1598
Ferdinand II 1621
1665
1474-1504 Queen KINGS OF SPAIN 1701
1504-1506 King
1506-1516 Regent Isabella and Ferdinand V 1746
1516-1517 Regent 1724
Philip I and Queen Juana (Joanne) 1746
1759
Ferdinand V 1788
1819
Cardinal Cisneros 1833
1844
HOUSE OF AUSTRIA 1833
1904
1519-1556 King Charles I (Emperor Charles V) 1500 Son of Charles I
1556-1598 King 1527 1890 Son of Philip II
1598-1621 King Philip II 1578 Son of Philip III
1621-1665 King Philip III 1605 1886 Son of Philip IV
1665-1701 King 1661 1929
Philip IV 1941 Great-grandson of Philip IV
Charles II
Son of Philip V
HOUSE OF BOURBON
Great-grandson of Philip IV
1701-1724 King VPhilip 1683
1701 Son of Philip V
1724-1724 King Luis I 1683 Son of Philip V
1724-1746 King 1713
VPhilip (rethroned) 1716 Son of Charles III
1748 Son of Charles IV
1746-1759 King Ferdinand VI 1784
1768 Son of Charles IV
1759-1788 King Charles III 1784 Daughter of Ferdinand VII
1830
1788-1808 King Charles IV Son of Isabella II
1845 Widow of Alfonso XII
1808-1808 King Ferdinand VII Posthumous son of Alfonso XII
1857
1808-1814 King Joseph Bonaparte 1858 Grandson of Alfonso XIII
1886
1814-1833 King Ferdinand VII (again)
1938
1833-1868 Queen Isabella II

1868-1871--Provisional Government

1871-1873 King Amadeo I of Savoy

1873-1874--First Republic

1874-1886 King Alfonso XII

1886-1886 Regent Maria Cristina (Christina)

1886-1931 King Alfonso XIII
—1931 Second Republic

1975- King Juan Carlos I

The Portuguese Monarchy

^^^m Ro/non provincial boundary ditional borders or a previous history as a separate politi-

///// Roman pro»inc»i co A 395 cal unit. The Douro-Minho core had been part of larger
_.._ Modern Porrogof
—regions the tribal lands of the Lusitanians and the
C^^^ Swabion kingdom I
Swabian kingdom that had left it with a legacy of isola-
• CMM
—tion and separateness but until the twelfth century its
8
history was indistinguishable from that of Spain. It was
—The ancient Portugal Roman Lusitania and the Swabian Kingdom from this core area, however, that the Portuguese state
emerged and before the end of the thirteenth century had
Portugal derives its name from the medieval Latin term extended southward to the borders it retains in the twen-

Portucalense. which designated the country surrounding tieth century.

the Roman town Portus Cale (modern Porto), roughly Many historians, Portuguese and Spanish alike, have

the northwestern region between the River Douro and considered it an accident that Portugal, exposed and
the River Minho. First mentioned in the ninth century peripheral, developed as an independent entity. The
country has no distinctive natural borders. Apart from
ad. the Portucalense was an administrative area on the the western littoral its several regions are geographical
frontier of the Christian Kingdom of Leon, without tra-
extensions of larger ones in Spain. In its origins Portugal

lacked ethnic cohesion. Its language had a common root

with that of the dialects spoken by the people of Galicia,
which has never ceased to be a part of Spain. Historians
have seen the maintenance of Portuguese independence
as resulting from the early development of a colonial
empire, an extraordinary political and economic rela-
tionship with England, and Spain's untimely preoccupa-
tion with matters more urgent than Iberian unification.

Clearly a Portuguese government existed before a Por-
tuguese nation. Nationality developed around allegiance
to the king during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries,
and from that grew political and cultural unity and a

common Portuguese existence for all the king's subjects.

The selection of Lisbon as the national capital tied Por-
tugal's future to the Atlantic, making the Portuguese, in
the words of the Spanish writer Salvador de Madariaga,
"a Spaniard with his back to Castile." Portugal was the
first European nation to establish a sea-borne overseas
empire. Its dominion and civilization were extended to
parts of Africa, Asia, and America. Small, poor, and
marginal in a European context, Portugal ensured its
continued existence in large measure by its ability to
exploit far-flung colonies, and developments in the colo-

352

THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY 353

nies often had a decisive effect on domestic Portuguese dence has been variously interpreted as indicating an
affairs. Throughout its history as a separate state Portu- African or an eastern Mediterranean origin, the weight
gal has had an ambiguous relationship with Spain. It was of opinion leaning to the latter, but it is likely that the
an imperative of Portuguese policy to resist absorption
and the loss of national identity, but nonetheless the Iberians who emerged into recorded history after 2000
history of inter-Iberian relations was marked by repeated B.C. were an amalgam of several groups of migrants and
efforts by Portugal and Castile to achieve dynastic union. still earlier inhabitants who after generations of mingling
Ironically, in order to maintain the integrity of its empire came to share a number of cultural traits and adopt
and its independence from Spain, Portugal became an similar modes of social organization. They differed
economic dependency of England. greatly among themselves, however. In some areas a

In the absence of an easily defined national character sophisticated urban society emerged based on trade with
it is impossible to determine which of the distinct re-
gional characters is authentically Portuguese. Family —the Aegean in tin and copper the components of bronze
oriented, generally apolitical, basically conservative and —and supported by a prosperous agriculture. By con-
individualistic, the Portuguese are intensely patriotic but
not public spirited. Forgetting whatever in it has been trast the Iberians who settled in the region bounded by
unpleasant, they are given to nostalgia for an idealized the River Tejo and the River Minho were primitive.
past. They tend to be phlegmatic but not practical in
their political attitudes. Foreign influences are often re- Called Lusitanians, they were described by the classical
geographers Polybius and Strabo as a loose, quarrelsome
jected because they come from a mentality too different federation of tribes, living behind the walls of fortified
from their own to be assimilated. villages in the hills, engaging in banditry as their primary
occupation, and carrying on incessant tribal warfare.
Contemporary Portuguese historians have been reluc-
tant to study the unstable and weak governments of the The Lusitanians were marked by their contact with
early twentieth century. Although proud and boastful of the Celtic herders and metalworkers who moved across
their country's past achievements, they have been em-
barrassed by the failure of liberal democratic govern- the Pyrenees in several waves after 900 B.C. to settle in
ment to take root in Portugal and by the easy resort to the northern half of the peninsula. The heaviest concen-

authoritarian alternatives. tration of Celts was north of the River Douro in Galicia,
where they easily adapted to the damp, relatively cool
LUSITANIA climate similar to that of their Danubian homeland. The
Celtic settlers soon were fused racially and culturally
The west flank of the Iberian Peninsula has known hu-
man habitation for many thousands of years; however, with the native Iberians among whom they lived. The
the prehistory of the area is even more obscure than that
of most parts of Europe, and the origin of those earliest degree to which there was a Celtic genetic intrusion
south of the Douro is a matter of discussion, but the
inhabitants as well as the origins of subsequent waves of
Lusitanians would seem to have been Iberians who as-
migrants who each in turn absorbed their predecessors
similated Celtic culture rather than a racial admixture of
is a matter of scholarly debate. Archaeological finds in
southern Portugal are similar to those excavated in sites Celts and Iberians. Similar though they were in many
stretching across North Africa to the Middle East and ways, even in their language, there was nonetheless a
clear dividing line at the Douro between the patriarchal
are evidence of participation in a common southern
bandits of Lusitania and the matriarchal pastoralists of
Mediterranean Paleolithic culture that had its roots in
the African continent. Although later Mesolithic settlers Galicia.
and megalith builders, active before 3000 B.C., probably
came into the region from the north, all prehistoric cul- From about 1200 b.c. the Phoenicians, later their Car-
tures there appear to bear the impress of African cultural thaginian colonists, and by 800 B.C. the Greeks moved up
influence. Compared with adjacent areas, however, the
territory lying within the geographic confines of modern the western Iberian coast to Galicia and beyond in search
Portugal was an isolated backwater in prehistoric times. of trade, but the Lusitanian coast held no interest for
them. Although they established colonies elsewhere in
IBERIANS Iberia, there were no substantial settlements in what
later became Portuguese territory, apart from several
During the course of the third millennium B.C. the Iberi- Phoenician and Carthaginian trading stations exploiting
ans spread over the peninsula that came to bear their the salt basins and fig groves of the Algarve, at the south-
name. They provided the genetic base for the popula- ern extreme of modern Portugal. The Carthaginians,
tions of both Portugal and Spain. Archaeological evi- however, did hire the bellicose Lusitanians as mercenar-
ies, some probably serving under Hannibal during his
Italian campaign in the late third century b.c

ROMANS

Roman armies invaded Iberia in 212 b.c. to cut Hannibal

off from his source of supplies and reinforcement. Resis-
tance by the Iberians was fierce and prolonged, and it

was not until 19 b.c. that the Roman emperor Augustus

354 THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY

was able to complete the conquest of the peninsula, thousand settled eventually in Galicia and Lusitania.
Before the migration they had been peaceful farmers in
which the Romans renamed Hispania. The people south Saxony and Thuringia, where they had benefited from
several centuries of contact with romanized Celts in
of the River Tejo, Mediterranean in outlook, were docile Helvetia (Switzerland), and they attempted to recreate
their former patterns of life in the kingdom that they
in the face of the Roman advance, but it took seventy established in Hispania. In contrast to the nucleated vil-
lages and large estates that survived in the south, the
years to subdue the Lusitanians. Their banditry had a Swabian farms, tilled with heavy quadrangular plows
brought from the upper Rhine, were dispersed, single
barbarizing effect on areas far beyond their own tribal
territory and compelled the Romans to launch repeated small holdings to be divided among heirs in smaller por-
tions from one generation to the next. They bequeathed
expeditions against them. Native chieftains such as
Viriato, leading light cavalry skilled in hit-and-run tac- few place-names to the land, but they set a pattern for
landholding and agricultural technology that persisted
tics, harried army after army and occasionally decimated
in the Douro-Minho area over the centuries.
them. Viriato, the first of the Hispanic world's caudillos, With large parts of Hispania outside his control, the
or popular military leaders, remains one of Portugal's
folk heroes. emperor Honorius in 415 commissioned the Visigoths,
the most highly romanized of the Germanic peoples, to
Once subdued, however, the Lusitanians were quickly restore order there. They compelled the Vandals to sail
and thoroughly romanized. Their fortifications were dis- for North Africa and asserted hegemony over the Swabi-
mantled, and the tribes moved down from the hills to the
more fertile lowlands, where they were introduced to ans, who retained autonomy under their own kings,
agriculture. So complete was the process of pacification
that no troops were permanently garrisoned in Lusi- managing a well-organized government with its seat at
tania. Eventually the territory included in modern Por-
Braga, an old Roman provincial capital. The Swabian
tugal was divided into three Roman provinces, but none
kings and their Visigothic overlords held commissions to
was coterminous with subsequent Portuguese borders.
govern in the name of the Roman emperor and, although
The capital of Roman Lusitania was at Emerita
Augusta, the site of present-day Merida in Spain. Roman the emperor's authority was nominal, their kingdoms

towns of some size were laid out at Baracara Augusta remained in theory a part of the Roman Empire. The
(Braga), Portus Cale (Porto), Pax Julia (Beja), and
Olisipo (Lisbon), which according to legend had been Swabians tilled the land and left the towns to the Luso-
founded by Ulysses. Settlers from Italy were few in the
north, but large estates or latifundia were staked out in Romans. Some towns, such as Coimbra, remained en-
the Alentejo and the Algarve, where the names of Ro- tirely outside Swabian control. Elsewhere Luso-Romans

man villas survive in Portuguese villages. continued to operate the civil administration for the
Swabian farmer-warrior elite, and Latin remained the
Unlike other parts of Hispania, Lusitania played no
language of government and commerce. By the middle
significant part in the history of the Roman Empire. It of the fifth century the royal house and most of the
Swabians had accepted Christianity.
was neither populous nor prosperous, produced no lumi-
The Swabians lost their autonomous status within the
naries of Roman political life or Latin culture, and was
greater Visigothic state at the end of the sixth century,
without strategic significance. It was for five hundred
years, however, part of a cosmopolitan world empire, but by that time they had come to identify their interests
entirely with those of the Visigoths. The Swabian King-
bound together by the Roman road, sharing a common
dom retained its territorial integrity, however, as a
language and legal system, and its people, at peace,
viceroyalty traditionally reserved for the heir to the Visi-
united in a common Roman identity and citizenship. gothic throne, but geography served to isolate it from the

Christianity was introduced in the second century turmoil of Visigothic politics, of which civil war, usurpa-
tion, and assassination were commonplace instruments.
ad. later than in the rest of Hispania, but an ecclesiasti-
MOORS
cal hierarchy active in church councils had been estab-
lished by the next century. Despite severe persecution In ad. 71 1 an army of Moors (Arabs and the Moroccan
Christianity was popular in provincial towns and cities
Berbers whom they had conquered and converted to
but made little progress in the Lusitanian countryside
Islam) crossed to Spain as allies of Visigothic nobles who
until the late fourth century, by which time it had
had rebelled against Roderic, their king. Having killed
become the officially recognized religion of the Roman the king in battle and decided the issue against the mon-
Empire. Bishops, who had civil as well as ecclesiastical
archy, the Moors returned home; but the next year Musa
status, maintained order after government had broken ibn Nusair, Muslim governor of North Africa, led the

down in that part of the empire in the fifth century. best of his troops back to a Spain bereft of leadership,
intent on annexing it to the expanding domains of the
SWABIANS caliph of Damascus. By 715 all but the mountainous
adIn 409 the Vandals and the Swabians (Suevi), driven

by other Germanic tribes, crossed the Pyrenees into His-
pania. The Swabians, never more numerous than sixty

THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY 355

region of Asturias in the extreme north of the peninsula that became the dominant theme in Portuguese as well
had been subdued and was in the process of being reorga- as Spanish history.

nized as al-Andalus, the name by which Islamic Spain, Within fifty years of the Moorish conquest the Chris-
including its western provinces, was known.
tian kings of Asturias-Leon, who claimed succession
In Lusitania land was apportioned among the Moor-
ish troops. Bad crops, rebellion against their Arab over- from the Visigothic monarchs, had retaken Braga, Porto,
Viseu, and Guimaraes in the Douro-Minho area, and
lords, and dislike for an inhospitable climate put an end peasants and craftsmen had gathered for protection
to the short-lived Berber colonization along the River around their strongholds. For two hundred years the
Douro. The Moors preferred the familiar dry country region was a buffer zone across which the frontier shifted
below the River Tejo, especially in the Algarve (from the back and forth with the ebb and flow of Moorish attacks
Arabic al-Gharb, "the west"), an area where the Moor- and Christian counterattacks.

ish stamp remained the strongest. An Arab aristocracy THE EMERGENCE
OF PORTUGAL
assumed ownership of the latifundia or gravitated to-
ward the towns, where they revived lagging urban life. As the Christians extended the Reconquest, life for
The Berber majority fanned out across the countryside Mozarabs in the Muslim-controlled south became
as small farmers. For native rustics the transition from precarious. In the late ninth century ad. a large number
Visigothic to Moorish domination posed no problems. of them fled to the north, arriving at a time when the
Only superficially Christianized, they readily became
Muslims although remaining a caste distinct from Arabs so-called desert zone between Galicia and the Moorish
territory was being reorganized, under counts (comes)
and Berbers. Some Visigothic nobles who held to their appointed by the kings of Leon, as the Provincia Por-
Christian faith were reconfirmed by the Moors as local tucalense (Province of Portugal), a term first recorded in
governors, but many others converted to Islam and 883 to designate the Douro-Minho region. Separated
achieved status in the new society. Jews, who were al- from Leon by the rugged Tras-os-Montes province and
called on to deal with the Muslims and Viking raiders by
ways an important element in the urban population, con-
tinued to exercise a significant role in commerce and their own devices, the counts, who had their stronghold
scholarship and as artisans. The Christian Luso-Roman
urban and landholding classes retained freedom to prac- at Porto, developed local connections and governed with
tice their religion and remained largely self-governing a substantial degree of autonomy. By the mid-eleventh
under separate laws and institutions. Called Mozarabs century they had carried the frontier southward to
(Arablike people), they were, however, profoundly Coimbra.
affected by Islamic culture and adopted Arab social cus-
toms, dress, language, and artistic styles. In almost every ALFONSO HENRIQUES
respect except that of religion they were integrated into
Moorish society. In 1096 King Alfonso VI of Castile-Leon gave heredi-
tary title to the counties of Portugal and Coimbra as a
For two hundred fifty years a united al-Andalus flour- dowry to the crusader Henry of Burgundy on his mar-

ished under the emirs (later caliphs) who had their capi- riage to the king's illegitimate but favorite daughter,

tal at Cordova. Nothing in Europe approached Theresa. Henry was to be sovereign there, but it was
Cordova's wealth, power, culture, or the brilliance of its recognized by all parties that he held the counties as a

court. But, as the strength of the local nobles increased Count Henry of Burgundy
became the first king of
at the expense of a divided royal house, it became more
difficult to hold the state together. The caliphate was Portugal He founded the royal

torn apart in the eleventh century as rival claimants to reigning House of Burgundy
the throne, military commanders, and opportunistic (1094-1383), and King Henry
aristocrats staked out taifas (independent regional city-
was the first sovereign of it,
states), among them the emirates of Badajoz, Merida, ruling until 1112.
Lisbon, Evora, and a number of lesser states that warred
among themselves and made accommodations with the

emerging Christian state to the north.

The divided and leaderless Visigothic state had crum-
bled before the initial Moorish onslaught. Active resis-
tance was limited to small groups of Visigothic warriors
who took refuge in the mountain fastness of Asturias in
the old Swabian Kingdom. There they halted the Moor-

ish advance and, according to tradition, were rallied by
the Visigothic chieftain Pelayo (d. 737) to take the offen-
sive, beginning the seven hundred-year-long Reconquest

356 THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY

title of king of Portugal by virtue of his independent

conquest of Muslim territory and his direct descent from

Alfonso VI. When his cousin Alfonso VII of Castile

demanded his homage as a vassal, he refused. Alfonso
Henriques' assertion of royal dignity and his defiance of
Alfonso VII coincided with a renewed Moorish offensive
that absorbed Castile's energy and limited the king's
ability to chastise a recalcitrant vassal. Although later
Alfonso Henriques reluctantly performed his act of hom-
age, his royal title and Portugal's separate national iden-
tity were well established. He assured recognition of

Portuguese political independence by swearing fealty to
the pope, he and his successors holding Portugal thereaf-
ter as a fief of the papacy rather than of Castile.

Portugal benefited from one hundred fifty years of
wise and strong leadership by the line of unusual kings

descended from Alfonso Henriques, who in his long

reign of fifty-seven years laid a firm foundation for subse-

quent state building. He left a compact kingdom, which

— —grew from a core area the Douro-Minho that had a

tradition of independence and separateness dating from
the Lusitanians and Swabians and a corps of lay and

ecclesiastical lords who were tied by allegiance directly

to the crown. Using their entrenched royal power his
successors founded towns, compiled the law, and carried
forward the distinctly Portuguese Reconquest that Al-
fonso Henriques had begun on the field of Ourique.

Portugal as it was reconquested by Alfonso Henriques (1128-85) and THE RECONQUEST
Sancho II (1223-45)
To the Moors the Portuguese were the "bravest of the
vassal of the Castilian king. When Henry died in 1112,
Christians," but the Portuguese Reconquest regularly
Theresa was left as regent for their son, Alfonso Hen- relied on the aid of Crusaders and adventurers from
riques. Theresa alienated the Portuguese barons and
townsmen by appearing too willing to sacrifice their Aabroad. papal bull in 1 100 called on European chivalry
hard-won liberties and immunities to the designs of her
kinsmen in Castile. They turned to Alfonso Henriques, to assist the Hispanic kingdoms in a great western cru-
sade. In 1 147, when he succeeded in taking Lisbon, and
whom they encouraged to oust his mother and claim his during an earlier, unsuccessful siege of the city, Alfonso

hereditary right to Portugal. Henriques counted as many as fifteen thousand English,

Alfonso Henriques (reigned 1128-85) made war on French, Flemish, Rhenish, and Danish Crusaders at his
the Moorish taifas to the south, decisively defeating
them at Ourique (ca. 1 139), a battle acclaimed in legend side. Many returned home enriched by the booty they
but its site lost and even its date obscure. Ourique re-
had taken during the Crusade, and others went on to
mains an event of great signi6cance in Portuguese na- Palestine after the fall of Lisbon, but some of the Crusad-
tional mythology, in which Alfonso Henriques, like ers remained as settlers on the land they had helped to
Constantine, experienced a vision of the labarum, a sign conquer. Large tracts in the new territory were given to
of the cross in the heavens, and so gained assurance of the knights of military orders to gain their support for
victory on the field of battle. future efforts in the Reconquest.

Backed by his nobles, Alfonso Henriques assumed the The Alentejo was occupied after 1225 by Sancho II
(1223-1245), the weak and divided taifas there prefer-
ring the Christian Portuguese to the Muslim Berbers
who had asserted hegemony over what remained of al-
Andalus. The Algarve fell in 1249 to Alfonso III (1245-

1279), completing the Portuguese phase of the
Reconquest. Although the Portuguese were continually
called upon to defend the country against the Castilians,
they also fought beside them against the Moors. Por-
tuguese knights had served with distinction at Las Navas

THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY 357

de Tolosa (1212), a turning point in the Reconquest, own lands nobles were obliged to provide for the defense
where a Castilian chronicler reported that they had
"rushed into battle as if at a feast." of a sector of the country. Rural collectives were encour-

Lisbon became Portugal's capital in 1298, finally aged by grants of tax relief and local self-government to
bringing to rest a peripatetic royal government that had farm the poor soil of Tras-os-Montes. The Portuguese
made its seat at Braga, Guimaraes, Coimbra, and other
Cortes (parliament), composed of representatives of
Apoints along the road south during the Reconquest.
—three estates the church, the nobility, and the towns
predominantly Christian city, even under Moorish rule,
with an excellent sheltered harbor in the River Tejo, had a continuous history beginning in 1254.
Lisbon was already the economic, social, and cultural
center of Portugal before it was chosen as its political Early medieval monarchs were expected to be self-
center. It enjoyed a good climate and a scenic location, sufficient and to operate the government out of their own
and one Crusader had described its buildings as "artis- resources but, as government became more complex and
sime coriglobata" (crowded together with great skill).
The prominence of Lisbon ensured Portugal's future ori- expensive, they were forced to call on the resources of
entation toward the Atlantic, but the city, surrounded by
their subjects as well. In return for a vote of subsidies to
—the country's most productive area favored by both
—Romans and Moors grew at the expense of the coun- the royal government, the estates, through their repre-

tryside. It was not part of the Portuguese heartland and sentatives in the Cortes, compelled the king to listen to
remained remote from it.
their grievances, seek advice, and get their consent for

the projects for which the revenues that they granted

were intended. The stronger the king, the more willing

was the Cortes to provide the funds that he requested;
the weaker the king, the more demands were made on

him by the estates.
Though feudal terminology was used in charters and

THE MEDIEVAL MONARCHY deeds in Portugal for lack of a more specific vocabulary,

feudalism (that is, hereditary title to the use of land and

King Diniz (1279-1325) introduced Portuguese as the to legal jurisdiction on that land in return for personal

official language of the realm in place of Latin and im- allegiance and service to the donor) did not exist de jure

Oposed its use on the south. Called Lavrador (the in any developed form in medieval Portugal; in practice,

Farmer), he encouraged his nobles to bring their waste- however, situations very much like it did occur. Accord-

lands into cultivation and to take an active interest in ing to Portuguese custom landholders were limited to

agricultural development. It was not an easy step for a economic control of the property they held. Legal juris-
warrior aristocracy to settle down as estate managers,
diction on that property might be granted, but it was

and Diniz found it necessary to reassure them that "no separate from title to the use of the land. All govern-

baron shall lose caste by dedicating himself to the soil." mental and judicial power was vested ultimately in the
The new lands in the south, whose development he su-
crown, but in time it was delegated to landlords acting
pervised, provided an abundance of fruits, olives, wine, as the king's agents on their property. As the origin of

almonds, and grain that was turned for the first time grants of jurisdiction was obscured by the years, lords

toward stimulating Portugal's export trade but, despite assumed that they exercised it as a right, and the crown

increased production, Portugal remained a poor country had to review grants and titles to land continually in

even by medieval standards. order to reclaim and reallocate its own property and

Portugal's kings were fruitful in their children, legiti- authority.

mate and illegitimate. Favors granted by doting royal Portugal's borders with Castile were stabilized after

fathers to their numerous bastard offspring, those of Di- 1295. But the threat of war with the stronger Spanish
Kingdom was a constant concern to a succession of kings
niz more plentiful than most, frequently provoked rebel- in the fourteenth century. To keep the tenuous peace,

lions by legitimate heirs. The daughters of prolific

Portuguese monarchs were married well, however, ex- Alfonso IV (1325-57) had ordered the murder of Ines de

tending Portugal's political contacts to England, Fland- DomCastro, heroine of a romance with his heir, Pedro,

ers, Burgundy, France, and Denmark, as well as on suspicion that she was involving Portugal in Castilian

cementing dynastic connections with other Hispanic politics. When Dom Pedro became king as Pedro I

states. O —(1357-67), Justiceiro (the Judge) as he was called

The Portuguese monarchy had fewer constitutional because he punished the wicked indiscriminately regard-

limitations placed on its authority than those imposed by —less of rank proclaimed Ines his queen and forced his

custom and law on other medieval kingdoms. The king's court to do homage to her corpse, clothed for the occa-

government was administered by a centralized bureau- sion in the robes of state. When he died, Pedro was
cracy. The forais (charter rights) defined the relationship
buried with Ines at the abbey of Alcobaca, where his
of individual subjects and communities to the king both
directly and through intermediate lords or town corpo- tomb was embellished with the scene in stone of her

murderers in hell. Their son, John, became grand master

rations. In return for immunities and privileges on their of the military Order of Aviz.

358 THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY

SOCIAL, ECONOMIC, AND crown they regularly received subsidies that allowed
CULTURAL DEVELOPMENT them to meet their obligations and that also tied them
tightly to the crown.
The social and economic structure of medieval Portugal
In the central regions and on the lands in the south
Adiffered radically from region to region. frontier soci- added in the thirteenth century, the military and monas-
tic orders, the hierarchy, and military aristocrats had
ety developed in the north that persisted after the region been vested with vast latifundia to support their services
ceased to be a frontier. Liberties had been granted to to the crown and church. The land was tilled by share-
croppers, by peasants contracted to the land (though
soldier yeomen who were willing to take responsibility dependent serfdom appears to have been rare) and, most
numerously, by wretched masses of itinerant rural labor-
Afor defending their holdings. petty nobility or gentry
ers who worked without the protection of a lord or a
had risen among those who had succeeded in consolidat-
manorial contract that would have regulated their status
ing their holdings and those of their dependents, as had and assured them of minimal rights.

a caste of commoner knights (cavaleiros vilaos) who were The Sesmarias Decree (1375) brought about govern-
ment regulation of agriculture and served to stimulate a
granted land to defray their military expenses. But the stagnating economy. It ordered that all arable land be
put under the plow and allowed seizure by the crown of
dominant pattern in much of the north remained that of
the small-holding yeoman farmer who, according to the underproductive estates.
Germanic landholding system inherited from the Swabi-
ans, divided his land among all his heirs in plots that The hierarchy and many religious houses grew enor-
shrank in size with each generation. For the man who
possessed it, his land was as much an heirloom as it was mously wealthy by Portuguese standards from the lands
granted them during the Reconquest, and their wealth
a piece of potentially productive property. often implied great political power as well, which en-
gaged the crown in a running dispute with the church
Peasants in the Douro-Minho as well as in Tras-os- over title to land.
Montes formed collective associations (pactos de bemfei-
toria) to pay rent on fields and pastures that went toward THE HOUSE OF AVIZ
the support of the military aristocracy, which also agreed
Ferdinand (1367-83), last of the House of Burgundy, left
in the bargain to defend them. Originally they retained no male heir, but his daughter was the wife of John I of
full freedom to negotiate contracts with their protector Castile, and it was intended that their offspring should
inherit Portugal. Until issue was forthcoming, however,
and if unsatisfied to choose a new lord. As the frontier Portugal was to be governed under the regency of Fer-
was pushed forward, however, peasants were usually tied dinand's unpopular widow, Leonor Teles. John, grand
to one lord. The crown, particularly after Diniz, encour- master of Aviz, expelled the regent and was proclaimed
aged family and collective farming by alienating aristo- king as John I (reigned 1385-1433), by a Cortes called
at Coimbra in 1385. In response a Castilian army in-
cratic and ecclesiastical land to peasant proprietors. vaded Portugal to uphold the rights of an as yet unborn
Above them all was a small number of interrelated Castilian heir to the Portuguese throne. What had taken
place was a dynastic revolution that had provoked for-
great families, relatively poor in liquid income. From the eign intervention, but the struggle that followed was also
a Portuguese civil war. The traditionalist north sup-
Portugal, the Hispanic Kingdoms (1212-1492) ported John of Castile and the cause of legitimacy; the
towns and the south where the Order of Aviz was one
>v—-3 of Bit*m§ J fMNC£ of the great landholders, backed their John. The future
of the House of Aviz and, from the perspective of John's
% U' followers, the independence of Portugal were decided at
the epic battle of Aljubarrota near Lisbon. Fewer than
?i > seven thousand Portuguese on foot, under Nuno Alvares
J( AAACON Pereira, the Constable, and a contingent of English long-
^S
bowmen faced an opposing army of ten thousand infan-
o,...t y < ///
try and twenty thousand cavalry, the cream of Castilian
&i k>*tucal \ CASTILE s/f/
chivalry. As the Constable's men held their positions, the
J? S*""^ longbowmen shattered the enemy's heavily armored cav-
alry and won the day for John of Aviz.
_^~"" N 9>
- English aid to the Aviz Dynasty set the stage for the

I.U s W ^CMNAOA
J \(s^
50 -00 Sf|

MM*

11
1

THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY 359

—King John I (1385-1433) had a long reign—forty-eight years and imposed uncomfortably rigid standards of behavior
on them. More important, Philippa provided royal pa-
during which he achieved much in the way of creating administrative tronage for English commercial interests that sought to
and organizational order for the cities of Portugal and was called the meet the Portuguese desire for cod and cloth in return
Great because he invested the money in sea exploration, and was for wine, cork, salt, and oil through the English-run
responsible for the settling of the island of Madeira in 1418. His warehouses at Porto. Philippa also became the mother of
was the first reign of the House of Aviz (1385-1580).
an extraordinary line of royal princes who led Portugal
A stamp honoring into its Golden Age. For the poet Luis de Camoes they

King John I were the "marvelous generation," the brothers Durate
issued in 1948 the king, Pedro the regent, Antonio the Crusader, John,

—and Dom Henrique Prince Henry the Navigator.

John I distrusted the old aristocracy that had opposed

his rise to power. He promoted the growth of a lower

nobility attached to the crown and rewarded the urban
commercial oligarchy with position and influence in the

realm in return for its support of Aviz. He surrounded
himself with skilled bureaucrats who professionalized

royal administration and extended royal jurisdiction at

Athe expense of the old aristocracy. strong and confi-

dent monarch, John nonetheless summoned the Cortes

biennially to approve his legislation and lend legitimacy
to the title that he had seized by force. The future of the
Aviz Dynasty seemed assured by the presence of John's
five legitimate sons, but the king also provided for his
illegitimate children as he had been provided for by his
father. John conferred on his bastard son Alfonso the
hereditary title of duke of Braganza and endowed him
with lands and jurisdiction that amounted to creation of
a state within a state supported by a huge reserve of
armed retainers. The House of Braganza accumulated
wealth to rival that of the crown and assumed leadership
of the old aristocracy in opposition to Aviz.

The first Independence Issue ofpostage stamps in 1926 honored THE EXPANSION OF PORTUGAL
Alfonso I, the Conqueror, son of Count/King Henry. Most
Portuguese historians claim Alfonso as their first official king. In 1415 the Portuguese seized Ceuta in Morocco, the
western depot for the spice trade, and began a campaign
cooperation with England that would be the cornerstone that by the end of the century had put them in control
of Portuguese foreign policy for more than five hundred
years. In 1386 the Treaty of Windsor confirmed the alli- of most of Morocco's western coastline. From strong-
ance born at Aljubarrota with a pact of perpetual friend-
ship between the two countries. The next year John of holds on the coast the Portuguese manipulated satellite
Gaunt, duke of Lancaster, son of Edward III and father Muslim states in the interior and provided cover for
of Henry IV, landed in Galicia with an expeditionary
force to press his claim to the Castilian throne with settlers who had carved out estates in North Africa but

Portuguese aid. He failed to win the support of the Cas- derived most of their income from raiding along the
frontier between Portuguese and Muslim-held territory.
tilian nobility and returned to England with a cash com- Portuguese efforts throughout most of the fifteenth cen-
pensation from the rival claimant, but the war with tury were focused on Morocco rather than on explora-
Castile continued for Portugal until 1411. tion by sea and colonization of unknown territory.

John of Gaunt left behind his intelligent and cultured HENRY THE NAVIGATOR
daughter, Philippa of Lancaster, as the wife of John I to
seal the Anglo-Portuguese alliance. She introduced an Prince Henry the Navigator (1394-1460), to whom
much credit for early Portuguese exploration has gone,
—English element at court an "icy influx," according to
was not himself a scientist, nor was he well traveled, but
the Portuguese, that reformed the morals of their court he possessed intellectual curiosity and surrounded him-
self with skillful and imaginative minds at his retreat, the
Vila do Infante, on the promontory of Sagres. As master

360 THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY

of the Order of Christ, one of the crusading orders, he THE PASSAGE TO INDIA

commanded a permanent military force and had access The Portuguese conducted their expeditions in greatest
secrecy. Foreign investment, except by the Genoese mer-
to substantial resources. His order paid for fitting out chants living in Portugal, was discouraged. The advan-
expeditions of which the risks outweighed the expecta-
tions of profit, and it bore the cost of their failures. Henry tages that Portugal derived from advanced ship design
and navigational devices and maps, charts, and reports
prodded his mariners to explore beyond Cape Bojador from earlier voyages were carefully guarded. In 1484
on the west coast of Africa, a psychological as well as Christopher Columbus's recommendation for a west-
physical barrier that was thought to be the outer bound- ward approach to the Indies was rejected; the Portuguese
ary of the knowable world. In 1420 Portuguese seamen had an accurate measure of the earth's circumference
reached Madeira and by 1427 the Azores. In 1434 Gil that had confirmed them in their commitment to finding
Eanes rounded Cape Bojador and reported back to an eastward route.
Henry that it was not the end of the world.
To head off conflict between Portugal and Spain after
Although Henry's motives were obviously many, he
saw exploration primarily in terms of outflanking the Columbus's initial discoveries in America, the Pope's
Moors and contributing to the success of the conquest of Line of 1493 was devised by Alexander VI, a Spaniard,
Morocco. His attitudes matured over forty years, how- to divide the world between the two countries, Spain
ever, as his knowledge increased and he began to recog- having title west of a line passing near the Cape Verde
nize the separate advantages of overseas expansion. The Islands and Portugal to the east of it. The next year the
expeditions he sponsored were better planned and orga- line was redrawn in the Treaty of Tordesillas and moved
nized, and they began to turn a profit in gold and slaves. more than one thousand miles westward.
By midcentury Portuguese mariners had mapped twenty
degrees of latitude south from Cape Bojador and had RENAISSANCE PORTUGAL
perceived the curve of the African continent.
John II, called the Perfect Prince, was a ruthlessly effi-
ROYAL PATRONAGE cient royal bureaucrat of the kind described by Niccolo
Machiavelli. Commercial expansion overseas had altered
A conflict over priorities continued to brew between the the political balance of power within Portugal and al-
lowed John and his successor, Emanuel I (1495-1521),
factions: the old aristocracy, led by the duke of Braganza
and demanding expansion in Morocco, and commercial enriched by trade, to live on their own without need to
interests in the towns and among the lower nobility,
favoring expanded trade overseas and looking to Prince seek subsidies or to require advice and consent from the
Cortes in order to operate the government. They hum-
Henry's older brother Dom Pedro for leadership. Pedro bled the long-troublesome old aristocracy, which would
was made regent for his young nephew, Alfonso V survive only as a court-bound nobility, dependent on the
A(1438-81). scholar and collector of maps, the regent
Dom Antonio in 1580 declared himself king. He was the illegitimate
saw the Moroccan wars as a wasted effort and empha-
sized commercial expansion. In the practical matter of Pretender to the throne in that King Henry (1578-80) did not have a
securing profit from exploration Pedro was more effec- male heir. Antonio raised an army from his followers but was defeated
tive than his brother Henry. But Pedro's attempts to pull by the infamous duke of Alva.
back from Morocco led to armed conflict within Portu-

gal in which the regent died in 1449. An aristocratic

reaction took place during the reign of Alfonso V, and
for a decade after Pedro's fall no further expeditions set
sail, but interests revived as even the duke of Braganza
saw profit in the importation of slaves from Africa. In
fact the renewed wars in Morocco, championed by him,
had the desired effect of rechanneling the Sudan gold
trade away from North Africa to the Guinea coast,
where the gold was picked up by Portuguese ships and
conveyed to Europe.

Official patronage of exploration and trade was re-
newed under John II (1481-95), and to him belongs
credit for the first comprehensive plan for overseas ex-
pansion and the idea of rounding Africa to open a new
trade route to India. The crown would thereafter take its
"royal fifth," or share of the profit, on all chartered
commercial ventures, assume direct management of
trade, and reap most of the benefits.

THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY 361

crown and incapable of challenging its authority. In ad- courts, laws, local customs, and currency remained Por-
tuguese. Taxes were collected by Portuguese for use in
dition to being an astute politician Emanuel was a man Portugal. Portuguese troops manned the garrisons. The
of taste and refinement who used Portugal's new wealth colonies were under Portuguese administration, the
church under Portuguese bishops. Indeed Portuguese
—to embellish his court art and literature, theater and held positions throughout the Habsburg Empire out of
proportion to their numbers. The Council of Portugal sat
architecture flourishing under his patronage within its in regular attendance on the Habsburg kings wherever
narrow circle.
they made their capital to advise on Portuguese affairs.
Sebastian (1557-78) was the sole surviving heir of For two years (1581-83) Philip II made Lisbon his capi-
tal, and in later years it was not Spanish oppression that
John III (1521-57), whom he succeeded at the age of
his Portuguese subjects complained of but rather neglect
three. Unintelligent and fanatical in his maturity, he by a distant king.
launched a campaign in Morocco, where Moorish coun-
terattacks had reduced Portuguese holdings. His four- There was a current of resistance among the masses in
teen thousand ill-equipped troops were overwhelmed at
Alcazarquivir and destroyed. Sebastian was presumed the countryside that took form in a messianic cult of the
killed in battle with large numbers of the nobility. More
were captured and held for ransom, draining noble "hidden prince," Sebastian, who they believed did not
households of their substance and of potential invest- die in battle but would return again and somehow right
ment capital. The natural leadership was depleted, the
treasury emptied, and the government at a standstill all wrongs. Practically Sebastianism has been explained
during the brief interim reign of Sebastian's uncle, the
aged Cardinal Henry (1578-80). as symptomatic of deep-seated social unrest among ten-
ants exploited by landholders who approved of the Habs-
HABSBURG PORTUGAL burgs and as a demonstration of hostility directed at all

The royal House of Aviz died with Henry. Philip II of forms of authority. Several so-called false Sebastians sur-
Spain (reigned 1580-96 in Portugal as Philip I) had a faced in Portugal to claim the throne with the backing
better claim to Portugal than any of the several other
possible candidates. His first wife and his mother were of this popular sentiment. Some scholars have seen the
daughters of kings of Portugal. The master of the great-
est military machine and naval power in Europe, he was origin of the cult in New Christian fears of persecution

also the strongest candidate in terms of enforcing his by the Inquisition. Others have pointed out that nostal-
claim. Resistance was slight, and Philip's title was duly
recognized by the Portuguese Cortes. gic longing for the unattainable is at the basis of much

The succession of a Spanish Habsburg king had been of Portuguese art and literature or have seen it as a
anticipated for some years since it became obvious that continuing feature of Portuguese political life.

Sebastian lacked the inclination to perpetuate his More concrete political and economic causes for the

—dynasty. The union of the Hispanic crowns Portugal, dissolution of the dynastic union can be found in the
—Castile, and Aragon had been promoted for genera-
demands made on Portugal as part of the larger Habs-
tions by dynastic marriages. For a few years at the end burg Empire deeply engaged in European religious and
of the fifteenth century Portugal and Spain had shared
dynastic wars. Portugal was inevitably involved in these
Aan heir apparent. carefully negotiated scheme to link wars, for which the Portuguese had little sympathy, and
its colonies were exposed to attack by Spain's enemies.
Castile with Portugal by the marriage of Isabella of Cas- The Dutch pounced on Portuguese holdings throughout
the East: Ceylon, Malacca, and numerous East Indian
tile to Alfonso V (1438-81) had been wrecked when she islands fell to them, as did the depots in Angola and a

chose instead his rival, Ferdinand of Aragon, and set the John IV (1640-56) was the first king of Portugal to
course of modern Spanish history.
reign under the House of Braganza (1640-1910).
Philip II inherited several crowns in Spain, Italy, and

the Netherlands from his father, the Holy Roman em-

peror Charles V, and the addition of Portugal fit com-
fortably into the federal structure of the Spanish
Habsburg Empire, in which several kingdoms, each re-
taining its own separate institutions, recognized one
king. Contrary to the opinion put forth in some national-
ist histories, Portugal was not annexed to Spain and did
not lose its independence, nor was it an occupied country
during sixty years (1580-1640) under three Habsburg
kings. In Portugal Philip II and his successors ruled as
kings of Portugal. The government and the Cortes,

362 THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY

large part of Brazil. The Habsburg kings of Portugal gal after the pattern set by Louis XIV in France, and the

were helpless to defend the Portuguese Empire. Cortes ceased to meet after 1697.
With Spain at war across Europe and the burden
ANGLO-PORTUGUESE RELATIONS
borne almost entirely by Castile, the count-duke of Oli-
vares, chief minister to Philip IV (reigned 1621-40 in John IV had renewed the Anglo-Portuguese alliance
Portugal as Philip III), contrived in the 1630s to give during the long stalemate with Spain, and Oliver Crom-
greater direction to the Hispanic states, pooling their well had exacted trade concessions as the price for Eng-
resources, integrating their administration, and exploit- land's support. The marriage of a Portuguese princess,
ing untapped manpower. Catalonia rebelled in protest in Catherine of Braganza, to the English king Charles II in
1661 added prestige to the fledgling royal house, and
1640, and Portugal followed suit when required to assist English troops served in Portugal against the Spanish,
Philip IV against the Catalans. participating at the decisive battle of Vila Vicosa in 1665.
England sheltered the rich but vulnerable Portuguese
John IV (1640-56), duke of Braganza and nominal Empire but took in return a mortgage on its economy.
commander of the Portuguese forces ordered to Cata-
Portugal's domestic economy had been static since the
lonia, reluctantly placed himself at the disposal of his fifteenth century. Crop production never kept pace with
the increase in population and, though an agricultural
country when called upon by some of the nobility to be
king. The move was popular in the countryside, in Bra- country, Portugal was an importer of grain. No serious
zil, and in the urban merchant community. John IV also
had the powerful backing of the Jesuits, who offset the attempt was made to organize domestic industries until
influence of the pro-Habsburg hierarchy. The break with 1670, when one of the periodic depressions in colonial
Spain was, however, as much a civil war as it was a trade deprived Portugal of the means to pay for manu-
factured imports. The first effort at industrial develop-
revolution. ment lapsed when colonial trade perked up after 1690.

It was argued that throwing off the Spanish connec- It was Brazil's apparently bottomless wealth in gold
tion would mean peace with Spain's enemies and save the and later in diamonds that assured Portugal of the means
Portuguese Empire from destruction at their hands. In to pay for imports and destroyed for several generations
fact the Dutch returned nothing they had taken but took the initiative for development at home. Brazilian gold
more territory after 1640 and demanded concessions in also encouraged England to update its commercial rela-
return for support against Spain. Spain did not have the
tions with Portugal.
resources to press its cause against the Portuguese, who
rated low among Spain's priorities, but neither could the POMBAL

Braganzas force recognition of their claim on the Habs- Eighteenth-century Portuguese government was a highly
burgs. Only in 1668 was peace made between them. centralized bureaucracy managed by ministers responsi-

Portugal for its part had chosen to protect its overseas ble to the king and exercising as much power as he saw
fit to allow them. John V (1706-50) had been an ener-
empire rather than participate in a common Hispanic getic king until the last years of his reign when he sank
nationhood. Some historians have argued that the choice
into melancholy and turned over his government to ec-
condemned Portugal to be a small, underdeveloped
country dependent on England for survival. clesiastical advisers who were not up to the task. His
successor, Joseph Emanuel (1750-77), was indolent, ea-
THE HOUSE OF BRAGANZA
(SEVENTEENTH AND ger to reign but not to bear the burden of ruling his
EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES)
country and empire. He put direction of his government
The House of Braganza was an illegitimate line of the
royal family of Aviz and dated from the early fifteenth in the hands of a diplomat, Sebastiao Jose de Carvalho
century. Its dukes had been leaders of the Portuguese
aristocracy, and their wealth and holdings in land e Melo (1699-1782), later marquis of Pombal, a man of
equaled those of the crown. John IV, who was essentially
a businessman in outlook, had profitable interests in the genius and energy at once remarkable for his accom-
Azores and Brazil and at one point had considered sell- plishments and controversial for the methods he used to
achieve them. Pombal became the veritable dictator of
ing Portugal back to the king of Spain. His son Alfonso Portugal, using the absolute authority of the crown with-
VI (1656-67) was a degenerate whose brother, Pedro II out check and operating the most authoritarian regime
(1683-1706), seized control of the government and im- known in eighteenth-century Europe.
prisoned Alfonso in 1667 with the aid of the king's wife.
On November 1, 1755, the feast of All Saints, Lisbon
He ruled as regent until Alfonso's death and then in his
own right. Pedro introduced absolutist rule into Portu- was destroyed by an earthquake, followed by fire and a
tidal wave, that killed sixty thousand and shook the

—confidence of "Enlightened" Europe. The direction that

Pombal gave in the aftermath of the disaster "Bury the

—dead and relieve the living" brought him to promi-

nence.

THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY 363

King John VI, after acting as 1813. The Portuguese army was reorganized during the
regent for his mother. Queen war under British tutelage and put under the command
Maria I, succeeded to the throne of William Carr Beresford, one of Wellington's officers,
in 1816. As a result of the who remained in Portugal as regent in the absence of the
Rebellion of 1820, he agreed to a
constitution limiting the power of royal family.

the crown. THE CONSTITUTIONAL

Pombal took charge of rebuilding the city. He also MONARCHY (1822-1910)

undertook the restructuring of state administration to The war passed from Portugal, but the royal family
stayed in Brazil, which in 1815 was the political center
deal with Portugal's recurrent economic problems, stim- of the so-called United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil, and
the Algarve. In 1816 John VI succeeded to the Por-
— —ulating industry in the face of British opposition to
—tuguese throne in Rio de Janeiro.
overcome another trade slump and regulating the export
In Portugal itself discontent at Beresford's regency,
of gold and the production of wine to keep up price the absence of the king, and the country's diminished
status in the empire was expressed by the small middle-
levels. Portugal paid a price for the rational government
class intelligentsia and commercial oligarchy, who were
that Pombal sought to give through enlightened despot-
identified as liberals and called for constitutional govern-
ism. Opponents of his regime were arrested, tortured, ment. The officer corps, which had gained self-esteem
during the war, also demanded a larger role in national
and some executed. It was a token of his confidence in life. Both groups had confidence that a constitution and
his own power that Pombal turned to challenge the posi- a responsible parliamentary government were the reme-
dies needed for curing the country's economic and social
tion of the church, which had retained a degree of inde- ills. Although they wanted to emulate Great Britain's
political example, they chafed at the influence exerted by
pendence from state control and which Pombal despised the British in Brazil. It was the army, however, that took
the lead in 1 820 by demanding the reestablishment of the
Hefor its opposition to his reforms. initiated official
Cortes and the writing of a constitution. What followed
anticlericalism in Portugal, intervening in ecclesiastical
were years of experimentation with constitutions, a suc-
affairs, confiscating church property, and expelling the cession of attempts to provide stable government, and
repeated foreign intervention in Portuguese affairs.
Jesuits.
The 1 822 Constitution, written by a Cortes composed
With King Joseph's death Pombal's dictatorship was mainly of civil servants, academics, and army officers,
called for strong central government, a limited monar-
dismantled as quickly as it had been built. The restrictive chy, and ministerial responsibility to a unicameral legis-

monopolies that he had sponsored were suspended, al- Queen Maria II reigned from 1826 to 1828,
and from 1834 to 1853.
lowing the growth of a class of independent merchants
King (Regent) Miguel became
who brought relative prosperity to the country at the end the regent of Portugal for his
niece Maria in 1828. But in 1834
of the century and permitted the old regime in Portugal Queen Maria recovered the
throne from the self-proclaimed
to pass through the revolutionary 1790s unscathed. king and he had to flee to Italy.

THE PENINSULAR WAR

Portugal resisted participating in the continental block-

ade imposed in 1804 by Napoleon Bonaparte against

importation of British goods. For a short time in 1 807

Portugal was occupied by French troops, Napoleon

claiming that he had sent an army to liberate the Por-

tuguese people from British economic domination. The

—royal family Maria I (1777-1816) and her son John VI

(1816-26), who acted as regent during her long mental

—illness that began in 1799 took refuge in Brazil, where

a government-in-exile was established under British pro-

Atection. British expeditionary force under Arthur

Wellesley, duke of Wellington, compelled a French with-

drawal from Portugal and repelled two subsequent inva-

sions. Wellington used Portugal as a base of operations

for the offensive that drove the French from Spain in

364 THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY

lature elected by literate males. John VI, accepting his determined to restore the charter and remain in Portugal
as constitutional monarch. Leading an expeditionary
status as a constitutional monarch in Portugal, returned force from the Azores, where he had established a provi-
sional government, Pedro landed near Porto in 1832 and
Domfrom Brazil, leaving his heir Pedro behind as co- defeated Miguel with substantial British assistance in a
two-year-long civil war that pitted liberals against tradi-
king. The Cortes was willing to accept representatives
tionalists.
from Brazil but would not concede autonomous status
within an imperial framework. Having won the fight for The church had overwhelmingly supported Miguel.
The government under Mosinho da Silveira, which car-
a parliament vested with executive authority, the Por- ried on the regency for Maria II after her father died,
purged the hierarchy and abolished the religious orders,
tuguese liberals did not believe that they could relinquish
about one-third of Portugal's thirty thousand clergy. In
any sovereignty without compromising the sum of it. 1834 the government ordered the expropriation of
More representative of commercial interests than its pre- church property. Intended to raise funds to pay the debt
of the civil war, the lands and buildings of five hundred
decessor, the first Cortes elected under the new constitu- religious houses were sold at auction at prices below
their market value to approximately six hundred new
tion attempted to reassert Lisbon's economic control
owners who used government credits to make their pur-
over Brazil. With British support Pedro declared Brazil chases. The sale of church property resulted in a shift in
the ownership of more than one-fourth of all land and
an independent state and took the title of emperor, but
—created a new class wealthy landholders who were
he remained heir to the Portuguese throne.
drawn from the ranks of the liberal politcal oligarchy
Opinion was polarized in Portugal in reaction to the and were indebted to the policies of the constitutional
monarchy for their position. This group had the domi-
loss of Brazil. Politically aware moderates were caught
nant influence in the political life of the country through-
between those who gravitated toward the militantly anti- out the rest of the nineteenth century.

clerical radicals, who demanded a continuing political THE LIBERAL OLIGARCHY
revolution, and the traditionalists, who were allied with
Anticlericalism, economic freedom achieved through
the church and hostile to the drift in affairs under the unregulated trade, and an overweening confidence that
national honor could be restored through constitutional
rule of an urban, middle-class Cortes. Traditionalist jun- government were the chief tenets of Portuguese liberal-
ism in the nineteenth century. In reality the governments
tas, supported by smallholders and peasants, were that it supported came to office through manipulated
elections. Revolts by an activist army divided in its polit-
formed in the north to protect the communal liberties
King Pedro V (1853-61) left his mark as the poorest administrator
threatened by the liberal central government. Calling for to sit on the throne. He is blamed for the neglect of sanitary

a return to absolutism, the traditionalists found a cham- conditions in the cities, which brought on devastating epidemics of
yellow fever and cholera in Portugal The king and his brothers,
pion in Dom Miguel, younger son of John VI, who was John and Ferdinand, died of cholera.

seen to exult in martial, rural, and Catholic virtues. Pi

If the new emperor of Brazil chose to remain in Amer- ^H^H^wv wlis

ica, his brother Miguel would succeed their father in

Portugal, and there was no doubt that Pedro preferred

Brazil. When John VI died in 1826, Pedro reluctantly

returned to Portugal, pressured by the British to leave

his prosperous Brazilian Empire for an impoverished

country with an unstable constitutional regime. Backed

by the army, which was easily disenchanted by civilian

rule, Pedro demanded an accommodation from the lib-

eral Cortes in the form of the compromise Charter of

1826, which replaced the 1822 Constitution and re-

mained substantially in force until 1910. The charter

returned executive authority to the king, who governed

through a ministry responsible to him. It provided for a

bicameral Cortes, consisting of the Chamber of Depu-

ties, elected indirectly by a reduced electorate, and an

upper house appointed by the crown.

After the charter was adopted, Pedro returned to Bra-

zil, leaving title to the Portuguese throne to his young

daughter Maria da Gloria, later Maria II (1834-53).

Miguel was to act as regent on condition that he accept

the new constitution. Miguel duly swore to abide by the
settlement, was given command of the army, and

promptly seized power, abolished the charter, and ap-

pointed an absolutist government that offered him the

Portuguese crown.

There had been little resistance to Miguel, but Pedro

abdicated his Brazilian throne and recrossed the Atlantic

THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY 365

ical sympathies were regular occurrences. British and alternating parties in power at regular intervals, called
French intervention was required to forestall civil war rotativism in Portugal, was all but institutionalized. Be-
and protect investments. Despite anticlerical legislation cause political power was concentrated in so small a
group of like-minded men, compromises were easily
the country remained officially Roman Catholic, and struck, and reformist factions were quickly absorbed by
the established parties. Rotativism produced relatively
royal patronage in nominating bishops was confirmed in stable governments that nonetheless failed to come to
a succession of concordats with Rome. The Cortes was grips with Portugal's underlying social and economic
representative of a social and economic elite, middle
class in its origins, that was determined to retain its problems. On the whole, successive governments intro-

position by restricting suffrage. One percent of the popu- duced constructive programs that failed in execution.
lation was enfranchised. Property qualifications for can-
didates limited to forty-five hundred the number eligible JOAO FRANCO
to sit in the Chamber of Deputies. From the Senate, or
upper house of the Cortes, a new bourgeois aristocracy The year 1890 was a watershed in Portuguese political
emerged, the product of an inflation of titles to encom- history. It marked the beginning of a growth in political
awareness that contributed to the downfall of the monar-
pass the wealthiest of the elite. chy twenty years later. The government's retreat in the
Parliamentary politics consisted of working out per- face of the British ultimatum was denounced roundly by
the Republicans, who were organized as a political party
sonal rivalries within the liberal oligarchy. Large work- in 1878. The Republicans' strongest appeal was to na-
ing majorities set the stage for arbitrary government by tionalism. Portugal, they argued, would never be hon-
successive liberal ministries that interpreted constitu- ored in the world as once it had been until an outworn
tional guarantees very flexibly. Opposition to the oli- constitutional monarchy was replaced by a modern
democratic republic. Republican propaganda played on
garchy was centered in Porto, where the demand for a fears of Portugal's becoming a British colony or a prov-
broader electorate and decentralization was strongest
ince of Spain.
—from the industrial as distinct from commercial and
—land holding sector of middle-class opinion. By 1836 a The government reacted to the drive for broader suf-
frage by revising the electoral law in 1896 in order to
national movement known as the Septembrists had de- eliminate minor parties from the Cortes. The king's hand
veloped around the issue and had entered into loose and was also strengthened to permit him greater latitude in
unruly coalitions with both radicals and traditionalists, appointing ministers and dissolving the parliament, but
King Carlos (1889-1908), an artist and a distinguished
as the disparate extremes of the political spectrum chal- scientist, refused to rule by decree as his advisers in-

— —lenged ineffectively the entrenched and static center. sisted.

An artificial two-party system developed in the Cortes In 1900 Joao Franco, a conservative reformist in the
Cortes, led a minority of Regenerator delegates with him
—by midcentury. The parties the Regenerators some- out of the parliamentary party. Working to reinvigorate
parliamentary institutions, Franco appealed for electoral
what the more conservative, the Progressives somewhat
—reform directly to the people a new and unsettling phe-
—the more liberal agreed on policies and political tactics.
nomenon in a depoliticized society. In 1906, although
Shared patronage was the most cohesive force in keeping Franco had only a small following in the Cortes, Carlos
the party system functioning. After 1856 the practice of summoned him to form a coalition government with the
Progressives. The unwillingness of one wing of the Pro-
King Carlos I (1889-1908) was
the last important king of gressives to cooperate in the coalition splintered that
Portugal to reign. His son, party just as Franco's defection had broken the Regener-
Emanuel II, reigned for two
years upon the death of Carlos ators.
but had to abdicate in 1910
when Portugal became a The Republicans were the immediate beneficiaries of
Franco's program as prime minister to encourage greater
republic participation in political debate. They turned on the
well-meaning king, blaming him for the corruption of
Emanuel II as he appears the political parties that rotativism had made inevitable.
on postage stamps in 1910 Demands were made for a parliamentary investigation of
royal finances, as the monarchy was made the symbol of
all that was perceived to be wrong in the country.

The established parties had become so badly splin-
tered that no alternative could be found to Franco's

366 THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY

minority government, nor could the prime minister win In October 1910 troops in Lisbon refused to put down
a mutiny aboard two warships, and some went over to
approval of his legislative program. The parliamentary the dissidents. With no one in a position of authority
process had ceased to function when in 1907 Carlos
dissolved the Cortes and granted Franco authority to willing to take charge of the situation and his appeals for
advice left unanswered, Emanuel II fled with the royal
rule by decree. An attempted military coup backed by family to exile in England.

the Republicans in January 1908 led to the cancellation Portugal in its European setting today

of elections for a new Cortes and a crackdown against
opposition. In February Carlos and his heir were assas-
sinated in Lisbon, leaving the eighteen-year-old Emanuel
II (1908-10) as king. Emanuel could rely only on

Franco, against whom all parties were ranged. In an

effort to save the young king, Franco called for an elec-
tion and stepped down as prime minister.

THE PARLIAMENTARY

REPUBLIC

The Republicans became the party of urban, middle-
class radicalism, nationalistic, libertarian, and intensely

anticlerical in temper. Their active ranks included a high
proportion of journalists, and the publicity received by
the party in the press was out of proportion to its actual
size. Republican candidates in the 1908 and 1910 parlia-

—mentary elections got a small vote and that localized in
—Lisbon but factionalism prevented the established

monarchist parties from forming a stable government
capable of resisting them. (Six governments fell during
the period between the two elections.)

THE ROYAL SOVEREIGNS OF THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY

Reign Title Ruler Birth Death Relationship

—-1094 Portugal under control of Romans and Moors Grandson of Robert I of Burgundy;
—1094 Portugal becomes an independent state consort, Theresa of Castile
Son of Henry of Burgundy
HOUSE OF BURGUNDY
Son of Alfonso I
1094-1112 Count/ Henry of Burgundy 1057 1112 Son of Sancho I
Son of Alfonso II
King 1112 1185 Son of Alfonso II
Son of Alfonso III
1128-1185 King Alfonso I 1154 1211 Son of Diniz
1186 1223 Son of Alfonso IV
1112-1140 Regent Theresa 1209 1248 Son of Pedro I
1210 1279
—1 140 Portugal became an independent monarchy. 1261 1325 Son of Pedro 1
1291 1357 Son of John I
1185-1211 King Sancho I 1320 1367 Son of Bdwifd I
1345 1383
1211-1223 King Alfonso II, the Fat

1223-1245 King Sancho II

1245-1279 King Alfonso III

1279-1325 King Diniz

1325-1357 King Alfonso IV

1357-1367 King Pedro I
1367-1383 King 1 ordinand I

HOUSE OF AVIZ

1385-1433 King John I 1358 1433
1433-1438 King 1391 1438
1438-1481 King Edwaid I 1432 1481
Alfonso V (Africano)

THE PORTUGUESE MONARCHY 367

Reign Title Ruler Birth Death Relationship

1481-1495 King John II 1455 1495 Son of Alfonso V
1521 Grandson of Alfonso V
1495-1521 King Emanuel I 1469 1557
1578 Son of Emanuel I
1521-1557 King John III 1502 1580 Grandson of John III
1595 Brother of John III
1557-1578 King Sebastian 1554 Nephew of Henry

1578-1580 King Henry 1512 Descendant of John I
Son of John IV
1580-1580 King Antonio 1531 Son of John IV

1580-1640—Controlled by King Philip II of Spain (Philip I of Portugal). Son of Pedro II

HOUSE OF BRAGANZA Son of John V

1640-1656 King John IV 1604 1656 Daughter of Joseph Emanuel
1643 1683 Son of John V, husband of Maria I
1656-1667 King Alfonso VI 1648 1706
Son of Maria I
1667-1683 Regent Pedro II 1689 1750
1714 1777 Son of John VI
1683-1706 King Pedro II 1734 1816 Daughter of Pedro IV
1717 1786 Uncle of Maria II
1706-1750 King John V (Rethroned)
1767 1826 Son of Maria II
1750-1777 King Joseph Emanuel Son of Maria II
1798 1834 Son of Louis I; (assassinated)
1777-1816 Queen Maria I 1819 1853 Son of Carlos I; abdicated 1910
1802 1866
1777-1786 Joint Pedro III
1837 1861
Ruler 1838 1889
1863 1908
1799-1816 Regent John 1888 1932

1816-1826 King John VI

1826-1826 King Pedro IV

1826-1828 Queen Maria II

1828-1834 King Miguel

1834-1853 Queen Maria II
1853-1861 King
Pedro V

1861-1889 King Louis I

1889-1908 King Carlos I

1908-1910 King Emanuel II
—1910 Portugal became a Republic.

—

\o

om orfuBeiQium

Map of Belgium today ethnic problems, principally between the Flemings

Historically, the country now known as Belgium was, at —who live in the northern areas and speak Flemish and
one time or another, the property of many other Eu- —the Walloons who live in the southern section and
ropean powers, including the Romans, the French, the
speak French. The linquistic and cultural differences be-
Spanish, the Austrians, and the Dutch. It achieved its tween these two groups can be traced back to their earli-

independence from the Netherlands in 1830 after many est association.

centuries of foreign domination. Strained relations between the Flemings and Wal-
loons, which the government of Belgium has tried to
When the country was liberated in 1830, the people solve in a variety of ways, profoundly affect the educa-
tion of Belgian children, politics, economic affairs, and
yearned for total independence, although necessity dic-
tated a certain degree of dependence on other European religion. Until after World War II, the major political
states. Moreover, neutrality was forced upon Belgium by
the other European powers. This neutrality was main- — —parties apart from the Belgian Socialist party (BSP
tained for over one hundred years, but just before World —PSB for Dutch and French designations) were the Bel-

War II Belgium proclaimed a policy of "armed neutral- gian Catholic party, which was supported for the most
part by the Flemings, and the Belgian Liberal party,
ity," indicating that it no longer wanted to be dependent which was generally supported by the Walloons.

militarily on others. After World War I and particularly In this country that contains such great differences of
after World War II, Belgium developed strong economic opinion and culture, the two ostensible unifying forces

and military ties with its European neighbors and North are the church and the institution of the monarchy. The
America.
Roman Catholic church encompasses the vast majority
Internally, the country's history has been marked by
of Belgians. There are great differences, however, be-
tween the generally devout Flemings and the frequently

—anticlerical Walloons. The monarchy despite the fact

that Belgium has one of the world's more democratic

—constitutions is another force for unity in that the king

brings antagonistic elements together under his rule. As
one authority on the country has written: "Monarchy in
Belgium is indispensable to national unity in that the
King stands above conflict so that through him alone can
Fleming and Walloon, Catholic and anticlerical identify

himself as Belgian."

EARLY HISTORY

In his Commentaries on the Gallic Wars, Julius Caesar
referred to the Belgae as "the most courageous" of the
peoples his legions had encountered in their conquest of

Gaul. The Belgae were a Celtic people who had migrated

earlier from middle Europe and had settled in the area

368

THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM 369

A Belgian stamp leader and head of the Holy Roman Empire until his
commemorating Caesar
addeath in 814, the empire was divided into three
crossing the Rubicon
kingdoms and subjected to civil war as well as to disas-
Ambiorix, chief of the Eburones and the last warrior to fight Julius trous raids by the Norsemen. The weakness of the later
Caesar's occupation of Gaul, depicted in a statue near the location in
Belgium where the action took place. Carolingian emperors brought on a proliferation of pow-

—that later became known as the Low Countries modern erful nobles, who fortified their castles and walled their

Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxemburg. After being con- cities as protection against the Norse raiders; in the pro-
quered by Caesar's forces in the first century B.C., the
Belgae adopted the language of the conquerors and be- cess these nobles assumed prerogatives that had been

gan to assimilate Roman culture. By the second century exercised by the emperors, thus giving rise to a frac-

ad. the Belgic tribes began accepting the Christian reli- tionated society.

gion, which was spreading through the Roman Empire Before the Norsemen were finally defeated at the end

of which they were a part, but paganism remained strong of the ninth century ad. the Middle Kingdom had al-
ready disappeared; the territory of the Low Countries
among them. During the early Roman period the Belgae
had been divided between the kingdom of France and the
retained contact with, and were influenced by, the Greek
Mediterranean settlements, particularly the one at Mas- Holy Roman Empire; and feudalism had been estab-

silia (Marseilles). lished throughout the area. The feudal system, which

—In the third century ad., Germanic tribes the was essentially rural, lasted for about three centuries;
—Franks moved into northern Gaul, pushing the Belgae
during that period the Belgian area developed as a center
toward the general area of modern Belgium. The Flem-
of industry and trade. Belgian textile and metalworking
ish-Walloon ethnic troubles that still persist in the 1980s
had their origins in the differences between the Franks industries became famous throughout Europe, and Bel-
gium's location on the North Sea made it a crossroads
and the Belgae in the third century. The modern Flem- of maritime trade and travel. The easy access to the
ings of northern Belgium are descended from the Ger- interior by way of navigable waterways and the old Ro-
manic Franks, and the Walloons of the south are the
man roads also made the Low Countries the terminus of
descendants of the Celtic Belgae. much overland commerce.

Over the next few centuries as the power of Rome The growth of industry and trade conflicted with the
declined, Frankish kings challenged Roman hegemony
agrarian feudal system as merchants and manufacturers
in northern Gaul and eventually incorporated the land
into their empires. Under Clovis in the late fifth and early established themselves as a class of freemen between the
sixth centuries ad., the Belgians were re-Christianized,
having lapsed back into paganism after their earlier con- feudal overlords and the serfs. The new industrial and
version. Although the veneer of Christianity remained
thin, this time the new religion took root, and Chris- commercial centers attracted serfs from the rural areas.
tianity eventually flourished among the people of the
The serfs became freemen, but a rigid class distinction
Low Countries. Both Clovis and Charlemagne estab- evolved between them and the merchant class. As towns

lished powerful empires, but both were followed by weak grew, powerful merchant guilds secured charters from

rulers who could not avert long periods of strife and Baldwin and Queen Judith. Important to the recording of the royal
history ofBelgium is the mention of the counts and countesses ofFland-
turmoil. Clovis's Merovingian Empire plunged into two ers, for Flanders, the main province ofBelgium, was ruled by them from
centuries of troubles after his death in the early sixth the time of Charlemagne's demise to 1384 when the country came under
century, and it was not until the Carolingian Dynasty Burgundy. History records the first count of Flanders as Baldwin, the
was established that some semblance of stability was Flemish chieftain, who started the reign in 862. In 864, Judith, the
restored. After Charlemagne, the greatest Carolingian daughter of Charles the Bald, king of France, and the widow of Ethel-
wulf, king of England, "attached herself" to Baldwin. The king, after
many attempts to break up the union, finally, upon the advice of the
pope, who feared a lack of recognition by France would turn Baldwin
to the Normans, conferred the title of count of Flanders on Baldwin I.

370 THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM

Baldwin II, the second count Baldwin III. the fourth count
of Flanders (878-918) of Flanders (950-61)

Arnuff I. the third count of Arnuff I. the Elder. /A? yf/rA
Flanders (918-50; 961-64) count of Flanders (961-64).

Arnuff II, the sixth count £** ' s^rMk
of Flanders (964-89)
WtsH
Baldwin IV, the seventh count
of Flanders (989-1035) 9

Ml

1-

Baldwin V, the eighth count
of Flanders (1035-67)

Baldwin VI, the ninth count
of Flanders (1067-70)

- -^Hiftrt

Arnuff III, the tenth count Robert I and his son Robert II, Baldwin VII, the thirteenth count
of Flanders (1070-71) who became the twelfth count of Flanders (1111-19)
of Flanders (1093-1111)
Robert I. the eleventh count
of Flanders (1071-93)

THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM 371

feudal overlords for the establishment of law and munici- Charles the Good, the fourteenth
pal institutions. The charters usually granted rights to count of Flanders (1119-1127)
merchants that were denied to workers, and the class
system that emerged severely inhibited upward mobility. William Clito of Normandy,
In the thirteenth century, dissatisfaction on the part of the fifteenth count of
the workers led to a series of uprisings that, toward the Flanders (1127-28)
end of the century, became virtual revolution. The upper
classes, terrified by the worker uprisings, called on the Dirk of Alsace, the sixteenth
count of Flanders (1128-57)
French king for help in putting down the unrest. En-
gland, fearing undue French influence in the area, also Philip of Alsace, the seventeenth
count of Flanders (1157-91)
intervened.
Baldwin VIII, the eighteenth
The history of the Low Countries for the next several count of Flanders united the
countships of Flanders and
centuries was one of foreign intervention and domina- Hainaut (1191-95)
tion, dynastic struggles, worker unrest, and rising and
falling economic fortunes. Countess Margareta of

In the late fourteenth century the Low Countries came Constantinople, the eighteenth

under the political hegemony of the dukes of Burgundy, count(ess) of Flanders
who initiated a reign during which the economy flour- (1191-94)
ished and the area experienced a golden age of scholai-
ship, culture, and commerce.

By the middle of the sixteenth century the Burgundian
period had ended, and the Spanish had gained control

over the Low Countries. Philip II of Spain tried to re-

duce the autonomy of the prosperous cities and towns

and, in so doing, unleashed almost a century of warfare
that finally resulted in the independence of the Nether-
lands but left the Belgian provinces under Spanish rule.

From that point on, Belgium was a pawn in the power

struggles and the religious conflicts of the great Eu-
ropean nations, passing from the Spanish Habsburgs to
the Austrian Habsburgs to the French to the Dutch and
often serving as a battleground for the contesting armies
of the major European powers. As a result of the reli-
gious strife of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
great numbers of Protestants from the Belgian provinces
migrated to England, America, and Scandinavia, taking
with them their skills in commerce and industry.

During the seventeenth and early eighteenth centu-
ries, the linguistic differences of the Flemings and the
Walloons became more intense. Under the later Burgun-
dian dukes, all oaths of office in the northern provinces
had been taken in the Flemish language. Under Philip II,
however, French became the administrative language of
the entire area. During the years of the Spanish Inquisi-
tion when Protestants fled northward, the language fron-

—tier between the Flemish speakers in the north and the
—French speakers in the south was again reinforced.

When the area was ceded to Austria in 1713, the lan-

guage of administration for the entire area was again
French.

During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Bel-
gians had little or no control over the international
events that shaped their destiny. They had no voice in
the councils that decided on war or peace in Europe,
even though Belgium was often the battleground, nor
were they consulted on the peace treaties that ended the

372 THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM

Margareta in later life, just many wars and often changed their territorial borders.
be/ore her death in 1/94 The Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which ended the

Baldwin IX (1195-1206). Thirty Years War, recognized Holland as an indepen-
dent country and, with a subsequent treaty in 1661, con-
the nineteenth count of Flanders firmed the closing of the Schelde estuary and thus
(1195-1206)
strangled the port of Antwerp. From 1609 to 1715 the
Joanna of Constantinople, the Belgian provinces were known as the Spanish Nether-
twentieth count (ess) of Flanders,
was the daughter of Baldwin IX. lands and suffered heavily from wars fought by Spain,
France, England, and Holland. In the early part of the
AMtm eighteenth century, once again by treaties engineered by
the major powers, the Belgian provinces became the
Ferdinand of Portugal, the Austrian Netherlands.
twentieth count of Flanders,
was the husband of Joanna Under Austrian rule during most of the eighteenth
(coregent with her from 1212 to century, the Belgian provinces made great progress in

1233). Aboth agriculture and industry. great deal of effort was

put into the building of roads and canals. Despite Aus-
trian efforts during their period of rule, the port of Ant-
werp continued to languish as Belgian ships were denied
use of the Schelde estuary. In another area of conflict
with the Dutch, however, the Austrians were successful.

—This involved the barrier fortresses a series of military
—garrisons in Belgian towns that the Dutch maintained

and forced the Belgians to pay for. The Austrian em-
peror, Joseph II, finally forced the Dutch to abandon the
forts and leave Belgium. The Austrian efforts to weaken
Dutch influence in the area were appreciated by the
Belgians, but efforts to impose autocratic rule by the
Austrians met stiff resistance. The French Revolution of
1789 spurred the Belgians to action, and they declared

independence; but powerful Austrian armies quickly
ended the life of the United States of Belgium.

In the early 1790s the French revolutionary armies
invaded Belgium and, eventually, drove out the Austri-
ans. By 1795 the Belgian provinces had been annexed by
France. French rule, however, was short-lived. Napo-
leon's disaster in Russia and his final defeat at Waterloo
(a few miles south of Brussels) ended the twenty-year
period of French hegemony in the area. The major Eu-
ropean powers, meeting in the Congress of Vienna, de-

cided that the Low Countries should be united and

Countess Margaret (1244-80). Guy de Dampierre,

daughter of Joanna, is honored the twenty-second
on a Belgian commemorative count of Flanders (1280-1305)

stamp.

••••••••i

* ij i

Thomas of Savoy was the itf£
second husband of Joanna and minw-uiionf enhi i

served as coregent with her :
\
from 1237 to 1244. He was
iti »<
considered the twenty-first
count of Flanders.

THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM 373

Robert III of Bethune. the twenty- —mined to win their freedom. The great powers Austria,
third count of Flanders (1305-22) —France, Great Britain, Prussia, and Russia intervened

-fcilir-^ to impose a cease-fire and, eventually, to approve of an
independent Belgium. The bulk of the fighting in the
NLouis I of ewers, the twenty- revolution had fallen on the urban workers and the peas-

fourth count of Flanders (1322-37) ants but, ironically, the bourgeoisie, many of whom had

Louis II de Male, the not favored independence, acquired political power in
twenty-fifth count of Flanders
(1345-84), was secretly Athe new state. provisional government was established
murdered by his son-in-law's
brother, the duke of BerrL The and soon declared independence and arranged for elec-
son-in-law, Philip the Bold, tions to the Belgian National Congress. The great powers
duke of Burgundy, then had had advocated that the Belgians accept a son of the
his wife Margaret, the daughter Dutch king as the new king of Belgium, but the congress
of Louis II, placed in reign voted to exclude the House of Orange from the throne
(1384-1405). of Belgium. Once the constitution was drafted in Febru-
ary 1831, a search was undertaken to select an appropri-
created the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, which ate king. The throne was first offered to the duke of
combined Holland, Belgium and Luxemburg under Wil-
liam of Orange, the Dutch king. The new kingdom pros- Nemours, who was the son of Louis-Philippe of France;
pered and, because Antwerp was reopened, Belgian trade
again became important. the British were opposed to this choice, and it was aban-
doned. It was then offered to Leopold of the House of
For a time it seemed as though the United Kingdom Saxe-Coburg.

of the Netherlands might succeed in spite of ethnic and The constitution, which was liberal in most respects,
religious differences, but old problems and old enmities guaranteed not only freedom of the press but also free-
were never far beneath the surface. Before long the Bel-
gians believed that they were being treated as second- dom of association, education, and worship. It assured
class citizens in the new arrangement. The Belgians were
bothered by edicts that directed them to assume half the citizens of the inviolability of the home, the right of
national debt even though Holland had entered the petition, and equality under the law. The constitution
allowed for little future change, however. In fact it has
union with an indebtedness many times larger than Bel- been amended only three times since 1831.

gium's. In addition, seats in the legislature were divided One of the essential features of the constitution was
equally despite the fact that Belgium's population out- the concept of the monarchy. The monarchy was to be
numbered the Dutch by more than 1 million. Finally, hereditary, and women were excluded from succession
both the Flemings and Walloons of Belgium were in- to the throne. The king was to have the power to dissolve

tensely Roman Catholic and were concerned about being the National Congress, appoint ministers and judges,

ruled by a Dutch Calvinist. Tensions mounted until the issue currency, and make war and peace; he was also to
summer of 1830, when the Belgians successfully revolted be commander of the armed forces.
and declared their independence.
Leopold had been in the Russian army that fought
THE NEW KINGDOM Napoleon and had been married to the heiress to the
English throne. Since his first wife had died, he was free
William of Orange sent armies to the Belgian provinces to marry the daughter of the French ruler Louis-
to prevent their secession, but the Belgians were deter- Philippe. In fact, one of the primary motives for choos-
ing Leopold was that he had relationships with
Belgium's allies. He was Protestant but relatively objec-

tive in religious matters; in addition, according to Bel-

gian law, his children would be raised in the Roman

Catholic church.
Leopold accepted the throne on the condition that the

great powers ratify Belgium's proposed Treaty of Eigh-
teen Articles, which would allow Belgium to retain Lim-
burg and Luxemburg. After Leopold had taken the
throne in July 1831, the Dutch began another march
against Belgium, and Leopold asked for and received the
aid of French troops. At this point, the London Confer-
ence drew up an amended version of the original treaty,
which was called the Treaty of Twenty-four Articles.
Although the treaty guaranteed international protection
to Belgium and recognized its independence, parts of
both Limburg and Luxemburg were lost.

374 THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM

Princess Charlotte and
Maximilian in their official

engagement photograph

The first king of the Belgians.
Leopold I. The crown was
offered to Prince Leopold of
Saxe-Coburg, and on June 4,
1832. he was proclaimed king
of the Belgians.

This satirical print was published in 1833 when constitutional conflict

was disturbing several countries whose sovereigns were of tender age.

Isabella ofSpain, right, was only three when her proclamation as queen

Domled to the first Carlist war. In Portugal. Miguel claimed the crown

ofMaria II, agedfourteen. Otto, left, shown as a boy of twelve, was king

of a newly independent Greece; and the imperial crown of Brazil over-

weights the head of Pedro II, five years old.

Princess Charlotte. Leopold I A!
had two children. Prince Philip
died in 1905. Princess Charlotte
married Maximilian of Austria,
who became for a short period
of time the emperor of Mexico.
His firstborn, the crown prince
Leopold, succeeded him to the
throne in 1865.

\

The liberation of Belgium tended to intensify the —tion of 1831 had in an attempt to satisfy both the
Flemish-Walloon dispute. The revolution not only dis- —Catholic and Liberal parties guaranteed complete free-
solved the political union with the Dutch but also weak-
ened any sense of community with them. The political dom of worship. The Roman Catholic clergy, however,
leaders of the revolution in Belgium, both Fleming and
were subsidized by the state.
—Walloon, had long admired the French not only for Belgium was one of the few European countries that

their politics but also for their language and culture. As did not undergo the turmoils of the 1848 revolutions.
one authority has written, the Liberal party regarded the Leopold's chief goals were to fend off the Dutch, in the
Flemings as set apart from the entire revolution: "In early years, and to keep the French and the Prussians
their [the Liberals'] eyes the Flemish masses had been from absorbing the country. At the time of independence
Prussia had been opposed to a free and independent
dangerously cut off, through their ignorance of the Belgium. Later, however, the Prussians tried to entice
French language, from the ideals of the French Revolu- the Belgians into a customs union (Zollverein). Although
tion which had so deeply influenced Belgium's constitu- Belgium signed treaties with Prussia in 1844 and 1852,
it refused to enter the proposed union.
tion." Once the independence of the country had been
achieved, French became the official language of the The French had not been eager to see a totally inde-
pendent Belgium, principally because they hoped to an-
country, but the Flemish masses continued to speak their nex the country again. Between 1838 and 1843 the
French, like the Prussians, made various proposals for
own tongue. In fact, the full impact of Flemish-Walloon
differences was severely felt at precisely the moment Aan economic union, which Belgium again refused.
when the two ethnic groups were forged into one coun-
simple commercial treaty was, however, signed with
try. France in 1845. Relations with France deteriorated
when, in the latter part of the century, it was learned that
Religion and politics, inextricably intertwined in Bel-
gium, continued to be sources of dispute. The Constitu-

THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM 375

the French had submitted a secret draft treaty to Prussia test. Even within Belgium itself, the Catholic party
in which France proposed that both Belgium and Lux-
emburg be annexed to France. This plan was never car- joined with the Socialists in opposition to Leopold's ac-
ried out, largely because of Great Britain's pledge of
protection to Belgium. tivities in the Congo. By 1890 Leopold had decided,

THE BELGIAN CONGO despite the reactions of his Belgian citizens, to leave the

In the late 1860s King Leopold II, who succeeded Leo- Congo to Belgium in his will. After long struggles and
pold I in 1865, became interested in expanding his terri- opposition, a bill of annexation was passed by the gov-
ernment in 1908, one year before Leopold died.
tory overseas, although the Belgian population was
indifferent to his aims. In 1876 Leopold II convened a WORLD WAR I
conference of European explorers in Brussels and set up
a committee called the International African Associa- In the years before the outbreak of World War I, Bel-

—tion (Association Internationale Africaine AIA); Leo- gium's industry, banking, and railroads boomed; the
country was one of Europe's leading exporters. Poverty,
pold was its first president. By 1879, with the assistance however, existed on a large scale. Conditions for workers
of the famous explorer, Henry M. Stanley, Leopold laid
plans for a free state in the Congo. While Stanley was —were dismal urban conditions were poor, and wages

—founding Leopoldville named after the Belgian king were low. Education did not become compulsory until
1914; approximately one-fourth of all workers were illit-
the French were also ceded certain territories in the erate. Therefore, the domestic situation was difficult
Congo. By 1882, however, Leopold created the Interna- when the war began.
tional Association of the Congo (Association Interna-
Because Belgium was a passageway to France, it was
—tionale du Congo AIC) and persuaded the United
crucial to German strategy in the war. On August 2,
States and Germany to accept the association's territo- 1914, the Germans crossed the frontier of Luxemburg,
which like Belgium was a neutral state. Two days later
rial status. the Germans marched on Belgium. In two weeks the city
of Liege fell to Germany; the Germans entered Brussels
By 1884 the Berlin Conference, which had been con-
vened to mediate the claims of European powers to Afri- on August 20. The Belgians under the leadership of King
can territory, recognized the new state of the Congo. One Albert, who had assumed the throne in 1909, attempted

year later, in May 1885, a royal decree proclaimed the to resist German incursions at Antwerp. When the Bel-

establishment of the Congo Free State with Leopold II gians were driven from the city in October 1914, they
as its ruler. Five years after the proclamation, Leopold located themselves in a narrow strip of the country west
persuaded the leading European powers to allow the of the Ussel River, where they remained for four years.
Congo to impose customs duties. Shortly thereafter the
The German strategy was based on a dual plan: to
—boundaries of the free state which itself was wealthy in
—rubber and ivory were expanded to include the prov- encourage the Flemish movement, thereby dividing the
country internally, and to make a separate peace with
ince of Katanga, which was extremely rich in copper. Albert. Although both plans met with what appeared to
Because the native population of the country was ex- be success, neither plan succeeded completely. The
Flemings were still frustrated by the government at the
ploited, while Leopold II was draining its wealth, other beginning of the war; an extremist group of Flemings,
known as the Activists, wanted complete separation
— —countries most notably Great Britain began to pro-
from the Belgian state. In 1916 the German governor
King Leopold II (1865-1909). His greatest claim tofame was thefound-
ing in West Africa of the Congo state (Belgian Congo), with the help of general agreed to split the Ministry of Arts and Science
thefamous explorer. Sir Henry Stanley. King Leopold died in December into separate Flemish and Walloon sections; at the same
time he reopened the University of Gent as a totally
1909. Flemish institution. In 1917, two hundred Activists met
in Brussels and formed the Council of Flanders. They
Prince Albert enters Brussels in demanded that the country be completely divided into
1909 after the death of King two administrative units, with Brussels as the capital of
Leopold II
Flanders and Namur as the capital of Wallonia.
The other aspect of the German plan was also partially

successful. Albert, much like the Activists, was inter-
ested not in aiding and abetting the German cause but
in restoring a free and independent country. The Ger-
mans first approached Albert on the basis of a separate

peace in October 1915; he was definitely opposed to their
plan at that time. By 1916, however, he appeared to be
more responsive. Although Albert sought peace for the

376 THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM

Albert I (1875-1934). king of »5»A* 3 irrl
Belgium (J 909-34). Second son
of Prince Philip Baldwin, count i^niHwHfc.^
of Flanders, and Princess Marie
of Hohenzollern. he married M1 «
(1900) Elizabeth, duchess of Ba-
varia. Their children were Prince
Leopold (who succeeded his fa-
ther as Leopold III). Prince
Charles, and Princess Marie-
Jose, who married (1930) Prince
Umberto of Italy.

1

?i -*&» i (j j

On October 25, 1918, King Albert I. Queen Elizabeth, and the crown
prince Leopold make their state return to Bruges. Belgium, after the
Germans were defeated.

Queen Elizabeth, wife ofKing Albert. 1876-1965, honored on a Belgian —war there emerged despite the collaboration of the Ac-
—tivists a new spirit of national unity that continued to
birth centenary stamp. She was bom on July 25. 1876. at Possenhoven,
in Bavaria, the daughter of Carl Theodore, duke ofBavaria, and Marie- prevail in peacetime.

Jose of Braganza. princess of Portugal. THE INTERWAR YEARS

On October 2. 1900. she married Prince Albert in Munich, nephew of During the period between 1918 and the beginning of
the then-reigning monarch of Belgium, Leopold II.
World War II, Belgium was in a state of constant flux.
King Leopold II died without an heir and Prince Albert became king
of the Belgians on December 22. 1909. From the time of her arrival in Out of the turmoil of war, a sense of national identity
Belgium, Her Majesty showed interest in the cultural life of her new emerged for the first time since independence in 1830.
country. She encouraged young artists by visiting exhibitions ofpainters Although Belgium was excluded from the inner circle of
and attending concerts, and was a gracious hostess of artists in oilfields. the Versailles conference and treaty, it attempted to de-
mand the revision of the Treaty of Twenty-four Articles,
Three children were born of her marriage to King Albert of the written in 1831, which would return Limburg and Lux-
Belgians: Prince Leopold, who reigned in Belgium after his fathers emburg to Belgium. This demand was rejected by the
death in 1934, under the name ofKing Leopold III; Prince Charles, who
was regent of the kingdom immediately after World War II until 1952; Versailles conference.
Princess Marie-Jose, who married King Umberto of Italy. In other postwar negotiations, however, Belgium

The heroic defense of the gained a certain amount of ground. It was given 2,500
Belgians in 1914, during World million gold francs and promised a thirty-year indemnity
War I. gave Britain and France from Germany through the Treaty of Versailles. The
time to complete mobilization same treaty ensured that Belgium's historic neutrality
and prepare for the battle of
the Marne. Albert remained in — —clause dating back to the 1830s would be abandoned.
the field at the head of his
Through this renunciation of neutrality, Belgium was
troops throughout the war. He able to safeguard its territory by means of military alli-
ances as was true of any other sovereign state. Belgium
died in a mountain-climbing also made a slight territorial gain in the previously Ger-
mishap. man-held territory near Liege.

sake of his country, there was no real opportunity to Domestic politics also went through a period of
negotiate with the Germans because of the basic hostility change and upheaval. Albert continued as ruler until his
death in 1934, at which point he was succeeded by his
of Albert's cabinet, the overall attitude of the Belgian son Leopold III. The political parties passed through a
number of changes.
people, and the opposition of the Allies.
By 1935, a year after the death of Albert, a three-party
When the war ended and the armistice was signed in coalition took power under the leadership of a Catholic
November 1918, Albert returned to Brussels with Bel- party member, Paul van Zeeland. Eventually, despite a
gian and Allied troops. He found his country in a better series of economic reforms designed to reduce unem-
ployment and taxes, his government fell, and leadership
political situation than before the war, but it had been
passed to Paul-Henri Spaak.
devastated by human and material damage. From the

THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM 377

A photograph of King Albert Crown Prince Leopold The various crises that the country had undergone in
taken to make an engraving for this period of turmoil assisted the development of the

a postage stamp —Rexist movement. The Rexists who took their name
—from Christus Rex (Christ the King) were a quasi-
Crown Prince Leopold, left; the Prince of Wales, center; and King
Albert during a state visit by the prince to Belgium Fascist organization, led by Leon Degrelle, a former
student at the University of Louvain. Most of his sup-
The Prince of Wales, left, with the porters were from the capital of the country and the
crown prince Leopold south. The organization had its roots in the nazism of
Hitler and the fascism of Mussolini. In the elections of
A royal group photograph taken 1936 the Rexists achieved great success at the polls,
gaining twenty-two seats. Because of Hitler's actions in
during the visit of the Prince of
Wales. Sitting, left to right: Prin- Europe, by 1937 the country began to turn against the
cess Marie-Jose, Queen Elizabeth, Rexists; by 1939 the Rexist party had only four deputies
the Prince of Wales, and King Al- left in Parliament. The Rexists were at one point closely
bert. Standing left, Crown Prince related to extremists of the Flemish population, such as
Leopold and Prince Charles, the the Flemish National party (Vlaamsch National Ver-
count of Flanders.
—bond VNV), which was formed in 1925 and cam-

paigned for Flemish autonomy from the state of Belgium

in 1935.

The frustrations of the Flemish population during this

—period which were exacerbated by the Belgian alliance
—with France after the war came to a head in the 1930s.

By 1935 the VNV began to make demands on the gov-

ernment on purely Flemish grounds. By 1939 seventeen

VNV deputies were sent to Parliament; they were deter-

mined to do away with the Belgian state. The cry of the
Flemish extremists at that time was "rVeg met Belgie"
(Away with Belgium).

In 1936 a new expansionist Germany was again ap-
pearing on the European scene. King Leopold III with-
drew Belgium from the Locarno Treaty and advocated
a policy of armed neutrality. By 1937 Belgium's indepen-

dence from the pact was recognized by Great Britain and
France, although they continued to offer assistance if it
should be needed. Leopold's armed neutrality policy re-
flected a desire on the part of Belgium to stand aside

from the disputes of Europe and to defend its own terri-

tories. This desire had been provoked and aggravated by
Belgium's awareness of the significance of Hitler's inva-

sion of Austira; the Czechoslovakian crisis; and the Mu-
nich agreement between Germany, Italy, France, and
Great Britain. On September 3, 1939, Belgium formally

King Ferdinand of Romania,
left, with King Albert during a

royal visit to Belgium

378 THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM

declared its neutrality to the world, but Europe was
engulfed in another war.

rS^ WORLD WAR II

King Albert birth centenary stamps (1875-1934) In September 1939 Germany invaded Poland; two days

King Leopold III and Queen On August 29, 1935, the after the invasion, France and Great Britain declared
Astrid in a wedding pose war on Germany. At the same time that Belgium re-
beautiful queen Astrid, consort nounced its neutrality, it began to mobilize. In accord
of the young king Leopold III, with Belgium's new policy of independence, it refused to
allow British and French troops to be stationed on Bel-
was killed in a motoring gian soil during the first months of the war.
accident in Switzerland. Queen
Astrid. who was thirty years old On May 10, 1940, Germany attacked Belgium. With

and a niece of the king of an abrupt about-face, Belgium called on the British and
Sweden, is seen here with her
French for military aid. The Germans began to bomb the
children, left to right, Princess country and issued a statement declaring that Germany
Josephine-Charlotte, Prince
was forced to occupy Belgium in order to forestall inva-
Albert, and the crown prince sions by the British and the French. Germany success-
fully cut off the Allied armies in the area and encircled
Baudouin. the country. Belgian refugees fled in panic, and the Brit-
ish and French were forced to retreat. By June 1940 the
Deep sympathy was felt for King Leopold, who less than two years Germans had occupied Belgium. Leopold III decided to
previously had lost his father as the result ofa mountaineering accident. remain in Belgium against the wishes of his cabinet,
King Leopold, who was driving the car when it crashed into a stone which moved the government to England. Disapproval
parapet near Kusnacht, a resort on Lake Zurich, was himself injured of his decision was based on the belief that the king's
and appeared at the funeral with his arm in a sling. presence in the country could be used to the advantage
of the Germans. In fact Leopold eventually became a
The king's palace in Brussels
German prisoner and was severely condemned for his

conduct during the war.
Criticism of the king grew even as the war was wind-

ing to a close. During the last year of the war, Leopold

III had been transferred first to Germany and later to
Austria. On May 7, 1945, he was freed by American
troops. Belgium was liberated on September 3, 1944, by
General Bernard Montgomery's forces. Although the
war was officially over for Belgium, German bombs con-
tinued to fall through the winter, damaging both Liege

and Antwerp. Eventually, in the spring of 1945, all
fighting ceased in Belgium, and peace was restored to
Europe.

THE POSTWAR YEARS

The years between World War II and the early 1970s
were characterized by five major themes. The first theme

was Belgium's desire for a role in international politics.
The second major issue was the resolution of the Congo
crisis. The third issue was the conflict between clerical
and secular forces in education. This was exacerbated by
the fourth problem, the increasing tensions between the
Flemings and the Walloons. The most severe initial
problem, however, in the postwar years was the so-called

royal issue regarding Leopold's right to the throne.

In 1945 the Catholic party became the Christian So-
cial party (CVP-PSC). In the elections of 1946 this party
obtained a large number of seats in Parliament, gaining

THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM 379

VNVmostly from the loss of and Rexist representatives. politics. The basic cleavage between the Flemings and
the Walloons had been intensified through the royal is-
Eventually, a coalition was formed of Socialists, Liber-
sue.
als, and Communists, all of whom were overtly hostile
The domestic situation in Belgium during the 1950s
to the continuation of Leopold III as king of the Bel- was still volatile, and foreign relations became increas-
ingly troubled by the situation in the Congo. When Bau-
gians. douin assumed the throne in 1951, social agitation was
momentarily quieted. The CVP-PSC still retained
At approximately the same time, the Flemish-Wal- power, although its popularity dropped to some extent,
loon situation was aggravated by a language census
taken in 1947. The results were shattering to the Wal- primarily because of controversial school legislation in
loons. The census showed that 51.3 percent of the coun-
try spoke Dutch; 32.9 percent spoke French; 1 percent the 1950s. By 1954 the CVP-PSC vote had dropped
spoke German; and the remaining 15.7 percent, who
were located in Brussels, spoke both French and Dutch. Asignificantly. sentiment of anticlericalism, which had
The Walloons not only were shocked by these statistics
but also felt that the government favored the Flemings. pervaded certain elements of politics since 1830, led to
the formation of a coalition of Socialists and Liberals.
The issue of Leopold's retention of the throne was the
focal point for political, religious, and ethnic grievances. By the 1960s, although most of Belgium's foreign
problems had been resolved, the domestic situation was
Because of Leopold's alleged collaboration with the Ger- fraught with difficulties. The essential problems revolved
around Flemish-Walloon relations, which in turn im-
mans during the war, he had been for the most part
repudiated by his fellow countrymen. Generally, how- pinged to a great extent on the country's educational
system. Other major issues were the economic and politi-
ever, the Roman Catholic Flemings hoped to see Leo- cal situation, the question of constitutional reform, and
the proposal of federalism as the form of government
pold return to the throne, but the more anticlerical best suited to the needs of the country.

Walloons did not. Achille van Acker, the first cabinet King Baudouin paid a visit to the
leader in the postwar years, felt that the king would unite United Nations headquarters in
the two antagonistic groups by sheer force of the monar-
New York City in J 959. He is
chy.
UNseen here, left, with
Meanwhile, the Socialists and the Communists de-
manded Leopold's abdication in favor of his older son, Secretary-General Dag
Prince Baudouin. The CVP-PSC, which was initially in Hammarskjold at the podium in
favor of Leopold's retention of the throne, now also
objected. At this point, the more liberal coalition asked the General Assembly Hall.
for a popular vote on the issue. In the elections of 1947
Their Majesties King Baudouin
the CVP-PSC gained another thirteen seats, and a new and Queen Fabiola. They were
coalition was formed between the CVP-PSC and the married in Brussels on December

Liberals. 15. 1960.

A vote was taken in 1950 regarding the king. Of the

total vote, 57 percent favored Leopold's retention of the
throne. There were, however, regional and ethnic
differences: 72 percent of the Flemish provinces voted in
favor of Leopold, whereas only 42 percent of Wallonia
and 48 percent of the residents of Brussels voted simi-

larly.

In the same elections of 1950, the CVP-PSC won an
absolute majority. When Leopold III was returned to the

throne, approximately 1.5 million Communists and So-
cialists went on strike in Wallonia, crying "Hang Leo-
pold." The continuing strikes and destruction of
property forced the government to recognize that the
only way to prevent a civil war was for Leopold to abdi-
cate. Even members of the CVP-PSC, who had previ-
ously favored Leopold, were opposed to his leadership
when they realized the destruction that his return had
caused. By August 1950 the government had announced
that Leopold would be replaced by Prince Baudouin,
who took the title of prince royal. In July 1951 Leopold
III turned over all power to Baudouin, who assumed the
title of king. The struggle, however, went far deeper than

380 THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM

A close-up of Queen Fabioia

King Baudouin. king of the Belgians, is a constitutional monarch, the Queen Fabioia in a formal appearance at a theatrical performance
country's fifth sovereign since Belgium acquired its independence in
1830. Together with the Chamber of Representatives and the Senate, he The king and queen in an informal pose on the grounds in front of the
exercises the legislative power. In addition, he possesses, with the assis- royal palace in Laeken
tance and under the responsibility of his cabinet ministers, the sole
executive power. The king reigns, he does not govern, but it is an unwrit-
ten rule of the Belgian political system that as an arbiter standing above
the parties, the king does, through persuasion and the prestige of his

office, guide the decisions of his government. He is, thus, farfrom being
just a figurehead, and may even be in times of stress the cornerstone of

the political edifice.

The king's youth was marred by tragedy: the death in a mountaineer-
ing accident of his grandfather. King Albert (1934), and the death ofhis
mother, Queen Astrid (who was a Swedish princess), victim of an auto-
mobile accident in Switzerland (1935). Later, the invasion of Belgium

in May 1940 forced him to seek refuge and safety first in France and
finally at San Sebastian, Spain, He returned to Laeken in September

1940 and spent two years at the Castle of Ciergnon. In June 1944, the
royal family was deported to Germany after the landing of the Allies in
Normandy, and the king became one of Hitler's youngest political pris-
oners. The royal family was first interned in a decrepit medieval castle,
Hirschtein near Heimar, where comfort was at a minimum. After the
final Allied breakthrough in March 1945, the royal family was trans-
ferred by the Germans to Strobl in Austria. On the way, the party was
caught in a severe air attack on Munich andforced to take refuge under
a railroad bridge while comparatively safe shelters were available at a

short distance.

The royalfamily was freed by a detachment of the Seventh American

Army on May 7, 1945; Prince Baudouin knew freedom again after five
years. He resumed his studies in Geneva, where King Leopold and the

royal family lived temporarily pending the settlement of what became

known as the question royale. He then returned to Brussels with King
Leopold in the summer of 1950.

After his return to Belgium in July 1950, Prince Baudouin first acted
as ruler of the kingdom under the title ofprince royal; he acceded to the
throne in July 1951 as king ofthe Belgians, following hisfather's abdica-

tion.

King Baudouin was born in Brussels, September 7, 1930, the son of
King Leopold III. born November 3, 1901 (son of King Albert and
Queen Elizabeth) and of Queen Astrid (daughter of Prince Karl and
Princess Ingeborg of Sweden). Besides King Leopold, his wife Princess
Liliane, and Queen Elizabeth, the royal family consists of Princess
Josephine-Charlotte, born October 11, 1927, married to the grand-duke
Jean of Luxemburg; Prince Albert, born June 6, 1934, president of the

Red Cross of Belgium, who visited the USA in 1955; Prince Alexander,

born July 18. 1942; Princess Marie-Christine, born February 6, 1951;
Princess Marie-Esmeralda. born September 30. 1956.

Prince Alexander and the Princesses Mane-Christine and Marie-
Esmeralda are the children of King Leopold's marriage to Princess
Liliane. bom in London, November 28. 1916, and married to King
Leopold in 1941. Prince Charles, who was regent of the kingdom from
1945 to 1950, is the king's uncle.

THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM 381

THE POLITICAL PARTIES Brussels. This proposal was deeply disliked by the Flem-

—In 1961 a coalition government formed of Christian ings, who felt that all French-speaking faculties should
—Socialists and Socialists came to power. By the late
be transferred to Wallonia rather than to another Flem-
1960s there were three major political parties and two
relatively ineffectual ones. The major party of the 1960s ish area.
was the Christian Social party (CVP-PSC), formerly
In 1968 street riots broke out throughout Flanders.
known as the Belgian Catholic party. Its support came
primarily from the Roman Catholic church, the Roman When eight members of the PSC, who were members of
Catholic-allied trade unions, the business community,
and the Flemish workers and farmers. The second the cabinet under Paul Vanden Boeynants, resigned en
strongest political party at that time was the Belgian masse over the issue, the government fell, and Vanden
Socialist party (BSP-PSB). It was supported principally Boeynants was succeeded by Paul-Henri Spaak. After
by Wallonian industrial workers but also gained some the government fell from power, the new coalition gov-
support from businessmen and some of the population in ernment acceded to the demands of the Flemings and
Flemish industrialized areas. The third major political agreed to move the French-speaking faculties to Wal-
party was the Party of Liberty and Progress (PVV-PLP), lonia. Since that time the crown has been relegated to a
formerly known as the Belgian Liberal party. It was the very respected position of trust by the populace.

most conservative of the three and had roughly equal The principal members of the Belgian royal family. Left to right: Prin-
strength in the Flemish and Walloon areas. The Belgian cess Paola, Prince Albert, Queen Fabiola, and King Baudouin

—Communist party and the Flemish People's Union an NII IK l.-l v~. i ,
—extreme Flemish group were the minority parties.
MmiWiwd in iI fcrf nRrf -
ETHNIC RELATIONS
H iroi ii in mui *., .-
In 1965 the Commission for Institutional Reform met to
discuss the Flemish-Walloon problem. It favored the —The House of Saxe-Coburg the Dynasty
establishment of cultural councils, one for the French-
speaking and one for the Flemish-speaking population.
There was also to be a cultural council for the small
German-speaking segment of the population. Each
council would promote and supervise the spreading of its
particular culture within its own area. Ministers of the
government would submit legislation to the cultural
councils on such matters as the use of a particular lan-
guage; education in general; literature, libraries, and mu-
seums; mass education; youth activities; radio and
television; and cultural relations with foreign countries.

Meanwhile, the Flemings remained dissatisfied with
the educational situation. The country's bishops were
opposed to the idea of a completely autonomous Flemish
section that the Flemings proposed at the University of

—Louvain a traditionally Roman Catholic and originally
—French-speaking university and refused to tolerate the

idea. In 1965 and 1966 there were widespread riots by
Flemish students. Rioting in Antwerp by the Flemings
also occurred during the same period.

In 1967 the bishops declared in a rather ambiguous
way that the Flemish department of the University of
Louvain would be autonomous, although the university
was still to be united. By 1968 the French faculties of the
university were so overcrowded that it was proposed that
the university expand to an area between Leuven and

382 THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM
THE ROYAL SOVEREIGNS OF THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM

Reign Title Ruler Birth Death Relationship

862-878 Count of Flanders Baldwin I, the Iron Hand 1013 879 Son of Baldwin I
878-918 Count of Flanders Baldwin II 1039 918 Son of Baldwin II
918-950 Count of Flanders Arnuff I (Arnold) (Arnulf) 1058 964 Son of Arnuff I
950-961 Count of Flanders Baldwin HI 1084 961 Son of Baldwin II
961-964 Count of Flanders Arnuff I. the Elder 964
964-989 Count of Flanders Arnuff II, the Younger 1150 989 Son of Baldwin IV
989-1035 Count of Flanders Baldwin IV, of the Handsome 1035
Beard Son of Baldwin V
1035-1067 Count of Flanders Baldwin V, the Debonnaire 1067
1067-1070 Count of Flanders Baldwin VI of Mons 1073 Brother of Baldwin VI
1070-1071 Count of Flanders 1071 Brother of Baldwin VI
1071-1093 Count of Flanders Arnuft III 1093 Son of Robert I
1093-1111 Count of Flanders Robert I 1111 Son of Robert II
1111-1119 Count of Flanders Robert II 1119 Cousin of Baldwin VII
1119-1127 Count of Flanders Baldwin VII 1127 Grandson of William I of England
1127-1128 Count of Flanders 1128 Grandson of Robert I
1128-1157 Count of Flanders Charles the Good 1177 Son of Dirk
1157-1191 Count of Flanders William Clito of Normandy 1191
1191-1195 Count of Flanders 1195 Wife of Baldwin VIII and sister
1191-1194 Countess of Flanders Dirk (Didrik) of Alsace of Philip I
Philip I 1206
Baldwin VIII of Hainaut Daughter of Baldwin IX
Margareta 1244 Husband of Joanna
1233 Husband of Joanna
1195-1206 Count of Flanders Baldwin IX (emperor of 1171 Daughter of Joanna
Constantinople, 1204) 1280 Son of Margareta
1206-1244 Countess of Flanders Joanna 1201 1305
1212-1233 Count of Flanders Ferdinand of Portugal 1240 1322 Son of Guy de Dampierre
1237-1244 Count of Flanders 1304 1346
1244-1280 Countess of Flanders Thomas of Savoy 1290 1345 Grandson of Robert III
1280-1305 Count of Flanders 1330 1384
1305-1322 Count of Flanders Margaret 1350 1405 Son of Louis I
1322-1337 Count of Flanders Wife of Philip of Burgundy;
1337-1345 Governor of Flanders Guy de Dampierre 1865 daughter of Louis II
1345-1384 Count of Flanders Husband of Margaret; son of
1384-1405 Countess of Flanders Robert III of Bethune 1909 King John II of France
Louis I of Nevers (Crecy) 1934
Jacob van Artevelde Son of Francis Frederick, duke
Louis II de Male of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfield
Margaret Son of Leopold I
Son of Leopold II
1384-1405 Count of Flanders Philip the Bold of Burgundy Son of Albert I
Son of Albert I
—1384-1477 Under the control of Burgundy Son of Leopold III

1477-1 795— Under the control of the Habsburgs

—1795-1814 Under the control of France

1814-1830— United with Holland (the Netherlands)

—1830 Independence as a monarchy

HOUSE OF SAXE-COBURG

1831-1865 King Leopold I 1790

1865-1909 King Leopold II 1835
1909-1934 King Albert I 1875
1934-1951 King Leopold III 1901
1944-1951 Regent Charles, count of Flanders 1903
1951- King Baudouin I 1930